


Pick Me Up, Put Me Together Again

by Anonymous



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, F/M, Hermione ends up in the past, Horcrux Hunting, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Regulus Black isn't evil, Snape is an asshole, The Marauders are also assholes, Time Travel, and I didn't want anyone blindsided if they hate it, and I do have an outline, and saves the world, and the majority of the story from Hermione's PoV, befriends a few Slytherins, but also not evil in the end, but it's definitely an endgame pairing, but trying to be good guys, especially since I'm making up a good chunk of this as I go along, in case anyone was worried about the 'making it up as I go' bit, just misguided and suffering from low self-esteem, some of the pairings will be slow-burn, the last pairing won't show up for a while, the main pairing and romantic focus will be on the first listed pairing, very slow burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-11
Updated: 2018-11-15
Packaged: 2019-07-29 17:19:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 25,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16268813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: During the final battle at Hogwarts, Hermione gets hit by a curse and thrown into the past, during The Marauder's final year at school.  Once Professor Dumbledore establishes that her existence in her new time period is permanent, that she cannot go back to the future but she can change it, she makes a choice.She will change the future, for the sake of the friends and family she may never see again.  She is going to bring down the bastard who destroyed her best friend's life, and make sure that her other best friend, the one she'll never get a chance to fall in love with now, will never loose a brother far too soon.  She's going to save the world, even if it means losing everything.





	1. Prologue

Hermione could feel herself flagging, but she pushed forwards, darting across the courtyard as she ducked nasty curses and flung back her own at the Death Eaters. After Harry's little stunt, coming back from the dead (and _Merlin_ how it had scared her, seeing his limp body in Hagrid's arms, she was going to give him a piece of her mind for that, later), the Death Eaters were scrambling too, and the rest of the Order seemed to have gained fresh energy. Seeing Neville destroy Nagini had hearted them all, too.

Voldemort was finally mortal again, though only a few new that little tidbit. 

They just had to give Harry the chance to face Voldemort directly, and destroy him once and for all. Then, they could rest. She just had to keep going, just a little bit longer. Block the pain and heartbreak from her mind, of the dead lying as though asleep in the Great Hall beneath the enchanted ceiling. Victory was so close she could _taste_ it.

"Hermione!" a voice screamed behind her. She flung herself to the side, rolling across bruising stone as a green curse zipped over her head right where she'd been standing. Pushing herself back to her feet, she had a brief glimpse of Ron's white face and wide eyes, fixed on something to her left. She spun around, and a sickly purple curse slammed into her chest.

Distantly, she was aware of Ron screaming again, but it fuzzed away into static as the whole world slowed to a stop. Golden sand erupted from the device around her neck, the thin silver chain snapping as she realized with muzzy horror that the curse had impacted directly against the time turner she wore constantly, concealed beneath her clothes. It had come with the books she had summoned a year ago (an entire lifetime ago, it felt) from Dumbledore's office, mixed into a pile of strange odds and ends that her spell had attracted. She'd held onto it even after banishing the rest back to the Head's office, a vague and foolish plan half formed in the back of her mind that she hadn't even told Harry or Ron about.

Now, her mind struggled, sluggish and thick, to formulate some plan of escape from the growing cloud of dust that surrounded her, beginning to flash in a neon rainbow kaleidoscope of color. She had no idea what curse had hit her, and her brain didn't want to work quite right. _I can't leave,_ she thought, arms reaching out as though to push through the cloud and barely leaving her side, muscles growing as heavy as lead. _Harry needs me._

The thoughts didn't help. She was frozen, everything outside the cloud that engulfed her gone from her sight. Without warning, a jerk like a Portkey snapped into existence behind her navel, and she screamed. The cloud of glowing dust collapsed in on her, and everything went black.

HPHPHP

She floated for an eternity.

If there even _was_ a "she," or a concept such as floating.

Nothing existed, and everything was, and consciousness slipped in and out of grasping not-fingers like sand.

 _Please_ , came a voice in the dark.

Her voice?

 _Please,_ it begged again. _I don't want to die. I'm not ready to die._

_Please, just let me go back._

There was no answer from endless void to the accidental traveler's lonely cries.

It was dark, and it was quiet, and time stretched on either side of her like warm toffee just barely holding together between sticky fingers.

A little more pressure, and it would break.

She, for there was definitely a "she," kept doing the thing that felt like floating.

Why was she floating? What did it mean, the tension shivering in the strands of time surrounding her?

A hole appeared, a tiny break in the pattern, ripples against the smooth surface bulging out and weakening everything around it. Like a moth to a flame ( _like a what to a what?_ ), she was drawn to the break.

It grew with her approach, a gaping black chasm that churned with sickening unnaturalness.

Time wasn't supposed to break and bend.

Holes were not meant to grow in accommodation of those who traveled too far.

The edges of the hole were jagged. Each edge shone like the blade of a knife, sharp and dangerous. Not right.

As she dropped towards the growing hole, the entire thing split in two, a new and unblemished band of time growing out towards the beginning of eternity from the one before her. It drifted into the distance, joining into an infinity of other bands, structures that warped and rivers that flowed as smooth as silk all stretching forwards and back in their own eternities.

The strands behind her, the origin of the hole, snapped forwards, enveloping her in something impossible.

She opened her mouth and screamed, memories and consciousness slamming back into her with the force of a car hitting a brick wall.

And Hermione Granger landed hard on the rough stones of a courtyard warmed by midday sun, took in her surroundings with shock that quickly overwhelmed her exhausted mind and body, and promptly passed out.


	2. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, apparently I lied a bit. This chapter is coming out tonight rather than tomorrow, because I got impatient.
> 
> So without further ado, here's the first proper chapter of my entirely self-indulgent rare-pair time travel fix-it. I do hope people other than me enjoy, but regardless I'm having fun finally writing it.

Hermione awoke some indeterminable amount of time later to the familiar sight and smell of the Hogwarts infirmary.

"Ah! You're awake!" a woman's voice chirped from beside her. She turned her head, groaning at the twinges of protest the move invoked from her stiff, aching neck. As she catalogued the feeling, she realized that _every_ muscle in her body ached.

"Yes, I can't imagine you're feeling too well at the moment, dear," the unfamiliar mediwitch said, correctly interpreting the grimaces Hermione was sure to be making. "You looked quite knocked about when the Headmaster found you in the courtyard, and your magical core has taken quite the beating.

"The Headmaster?" Hermione questioned. Her voice came out as a thick rasp, her throat sore from spellcasting and screaming and grief, as well as whatever had happened to her.

The mediwitch nodded absently, her concentration absorbed by the diagnostic spells she was running over her patient now that said patient was awake. "Yes, Professor Dumbledore. My apologies. You don't look at all familiar, and I don't believe the Headmaster recognized you either. You're at Hogwart's School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, headed by Albus Dumbledore, who I believe wants to speak with you as soon as you're up for it. It's not often we get unexpected visitors in the courtyard, especially ones with your array of injuries."

The mediwitch couldn't entirely hide the notes of suspicion in her voice, but Hermione's thoughts were busy with other topics.

Professor Dumbledore was alive. She had been a thorough fool, wearing a time turning in the midst of a battle, and now she was laying in the hospital wing of a Hogwarts where Albus Dumbledore was still the living Headmaster, and the infirmary's head was not a witch she recognized. The conclusion was obvious, but her mind shied away from recognizing her situation fully.

This may well have been the _stupidest_ thing she had ever done. A whimper escaped her battered throat, and the mediwitch zeroed in on her face immediately. "Are you alright, dear?" she asked. "My diagnostics shouldn't cause any discomfort, but please do feel free to tell me if something feels wrong."

"I'm fine," Hermione bit out, entirely unconvincing and not caring in the slightest, so long as it stopped the questions. She was absolutely _not_ fine, but blabbing about her predicament to a stranger from the past(!) would do her no good. Of that, at least, she was quite certain.

"Well, if you're sure," the witch said, peering down her nose at Hermione but not contradicting her claim, "then I shall call the Headmaster down. Best to get these sorts of things over with quickly."

Hermione thought about Madam Pomfrey and her fierce protection of injured students even to the point of standing up to the Headmaster, and wondered what the mediwitch she remembered would have done with a suspicious stranger who showed up out of the blue in her castle. "That, um, that sounds fine," she finally said, when the strange witch raised an eyebrow at her silence. "I think I should talk to Professor Dumbledore as soon as possible."

"Excellent," the witch turned with a swish of her robes and stalked to a the fireplace in the corner. Hermione was too far away to hear the conversation, and a headache had formed behind her temples that further distracted her from any attempts to eavesdrop. She was desperately curious, and desperately afraid at the same time. She well remembered what Professor McGonagall had told her about the consequences of meddling with time, back before her third year. They could be utterly disastrous. Hermione had done her own research, quietly crammed into what little spare time she had that year, and learned that meddling with time _could_ be done, with the appropriate but extremely complex safeguards in place.

If there was one thing she was certain of, it was that she had had time to place a single safeguard before being flung rather unceremoniously into whatever time this was. There was no possible way her presence wasn't going to end in catastrophe, unless she was more careful than she had ever been in her life.

Either that, or luckier that she had ever been in her life.

She wasn't naturally one prone to superstition, but seven years of friendship with Harry Potter had taught her that sometimes, a dash of luck and coincidence was the only way any of them were still alive.

Not that she would ever mention that to either of her best friends, not when she already had such trouble getting either of them to listen to logic and rationality. A ball of anxiety rose in her throat, choking her with its thick, prickly edges, as she thought about the last glimpse she'd had of Ron's face. He had been so distracted, so worried for her, and she had no idea what her time travel had looked like from his perspective. If her own inability to watch her back had gotten him killed, she would never forgive herself. They had only _just_ sorted things out, and she'd even let herself fantasize a little bit, before the battle demanded all her concentration, about a future with him once everything was done.

Now she might never get to see that future.

The sound of the infirmary door opening jolted her from her thoughts. Albus Dumbledore, alive indeed and looking just like she had seen him for the last time before his death in her sixth year, strode through the doors with the familiar twinkle in his eyes. "I'm glad to see you awake," he said, his cheerful tone hiding stern and implacable steel. There was no doubt in Hermione's mind that he would not hesitate to do whatever was necessary to protect his school and his students.

She did her best to clear her mind and let nothing but honesty and goodwill saturate her voice. "I am," she said. She swallowed, finding it harder than she'd hope to meet his piercing gaze. "I am also glad that it was you who found me. There has been a horrible accident, and I should not be here."

One bushy white eyebrow rose in curiosity at her words, but he remained silent, encouraging her to continue without words. The ball of anxiety in her throat nearly choked her words, cutting against her voice like glass against paper skin. Still, she pushed the words through her resisting lips, heavy and dangerous as they hung in the air between herself and her dead Headmaster. "I believe," she said, quiet and shaking but refusing to hide from the situation, "that I have time-traveled." His curious look morphed into brief surprise, before a calm mask smoothed over his face. "I was at Hogwarts," she continued diligently, "but we were being attacked by dark wizards. I had a time turner on me, and, and I know I should have taken it off when we were attacked and kept it somewhere safer, but I didn't think, and it got hit with a curse and now," she paused for a second and mentally reworded her next statement, "and now you don't know who I am."

Professor Dumbledore was silent for several long, agonizing moments. His blue gaze bore into hers, electric and oddly captivating. Finally, the intensity broke and he spoke, his voice calm and measured. "Do you know what curse your time turner was struck by?"

Hermione shook her head miserably. He must have used Legilimency to verify her story, though he would have known better than to delve too deeply if she was telling the truth.

Professor Dumbledore hummed in acknowledgement. "This is indeed a difficult situation, if you are telling the truth." Hermione's fingers wound anxiously in her sheets, and she frowned at him. If anyone would know what to do, it would be the man in front of her. Unfortunately, her hopes of a swift solution were swiftly dashed. "I will need to research this, and perform some spells on you if you are willing. If time is twisted in a loop around you, then it is imperative you give me as little information about the future as possible, so that it may be preserved as cleanly as possible. Unless I am much mistaken, I would guess that you have traveled back quite far in time." Hermione gulped and nodded in confirmation, wincing as the Headmaster's eyes darkened in thought.

"It is also possible," he mused, "that time has broken around you instead. It would be a violently messy way of ensuring a lack of paradoxes, and not the one recommended by those few witches and wizards foolish enough to attempt changing time, but you would be the one to suffer the brunt of the affects. I spoke with Madam Clawrson about your condition before you awoke. The state of your magical core would be consistent with such a brutal arrival through a tear in time."

The Headmaster's information spun wildly through Hermione's racing thoughts, and she gaped at him. "If time is torn at the point of my arrival," she asked, dreading the answer, "can I still get back home?"

The pity in his abnormally dull blue eyes gave her answer enough even before he spoke. "No," he said, the single word heavy and grim. She looked away as tears built in her eyes. "No," he said, more gently. "If time has torn and you are alive, then as far as I am aware, your return to your own time would be impossible. The nature of a tear in time is the creation of an entirely new timeline, one wholly separate and _separated_ from the original. Those who seek deliberately to alter time attempt to create clean cuts from which to begin anew, but it is a distinctly dangerous business, and a move that cannot be undone."

"I see," Hermione said, the possibility lodging in her throat and cutting off any hope of a better reply. Her mind whirled with the consequences of her own time being inaccessible to her. The full weight of it refused to settle, her mind shying away from what it would mean to be stuck in the past for good, her past now her unwritten future. She would have almost rather caused a paradox.

The utter selfishness of the thought snapped her out of her self-pitying daze. A world-ending paradox might have been easier for _her_ to deal with, but she could only imagine the kind of grief she would have gotten from Harry for even thinking such a thing. He probably would have leapt at the opportunity to change his past. 

Hermione just wanted to go home.

"All hope for your return is not yet lost," he said, correctly interpreting her expression. "I will research the necessary spells to be certain, but for now I suggest you remain here and try to keep your interactions with this time to a minimum. Hermione nodded silently. She couldn't bring herself to face his gentle smile and the lack of twinkle in his blue eyes. The memories of her trip through time were hazy and distorted, impossible to recall with any clarity, but she couldn't help the fear crawling up and down her spine. She might be stuck in this time. Stuck in the past with no way home, all because of her stupid inability to let go of a time-turner she should never have had.

She sniffled, her clenching the sheet over her chest so hard her knuckles ached. "I appreciate your help," she finally managed.

"I will return in a few days at most," the Headmaster assured her. She didn't watch him leave. When the mediwitch, Madam Clawrson, she reminded herself, returned, she barely spoke. A few potions were pushed into unresisting hands that she drank without tasting, and more diagnostic spells moved over her. They both lapsed into silence when the mediwitch realized her patient was disinterested in conversation.

"Well," Madam Clawrson finally said, lowering her wand, "aside from the magical exhaustion, you are as healed up as you can be. The Headmaster mentioned you should remain here for now, and I would have requested you remain for another night anyway. I can have the House Elves bring you some food, if you are feeling up to it?"

Hermione nodded, not trusting herself to speak. She thought briefly of Dobby, and wondered if he were currently suffering under the tyranny of the Malfoy family, or if she was far enough in the past that he hadn't yet been born. She was aware that house-elves had similar life-spans to humans, but she had never asked Dobby how old he was. It was another failing she could chalk up on the rapidly growing list of her faults.

Perhaps fortunately for her confused thoughts and the unpleasant tangle of fragile emotions that currently filled her stomach, her food was sent magically to her nightstand on a tray, rather than brought personally by an elf. If she was stuck in this time for good, she promised herself, house-elf rights would be a priority again. Perhaps she could get started on changing public opinion on their treatment earlier.

It was not, perhaps, the most pressing concern she would be faced with, if this time-period was her new home, but it was an easier one to digest than the others. Surely, she couldn't be the only person in all of Hogwart's history who believed slavery was an evil ill-suited to modern times. Professor Dumbledore, at least, had always looked favorably on her efforts, and she knew he would be happy to pay all the elves in Hogwarts if they would accept such a thing. Slowly, her musings lulled her scattered mind, and she drifted into sleep.

And thus, her first day and night out of time passed rather uneventfully. It was a rare luxury that she would find much harder to achieve in the days and months to come.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, comments are much appreciated!


	3. Chapter 2

Several days passed before Hermione saw the Headmaster again. They were surprisingly boring days, given the time travel. 

_Though perhaps that is a good thing,_ Hermione reminded herself, when she found her mind growing dull from boredom. Each day consisted of diagnostic spells from Madam Clawrson, who assured her that she was coming along quite nicely, food sent up from house-elves she never got to see, and not much else. After the first day, Madam Clawrson did agree to fetch her a few books from the library, or else she may have gone mad.

She wasn't allowed anything from the restricted section, which ruled out most of the books on time travel, and many of the school books available to her were quite out of date for her original time. In the end, she settled on paging through books on Defense and Potions, cataloging as well as she could which spells and brews she knew had been updated between whenever she was now and her sixth year, the last year she had attended at Hogwarts.

Finally, on her third day in the past, she was just finishing up a lunch of ham sandwiches and black coffee when Professor Dumbledore swept back into the infirmary.

"How have you been finding your stay in our time, my dear?" he asked, as he settled into a conjured chair by her bedside.

Hermione hastily swallowed a mouthful of sandwich, trying not to choke. "It's been fine," she said, as the Headmaster twinkled at her. "I haven't done anything, in case it is possible to return to my time." She couldn't help the hopeful note that crept into her voice. Returning to her own time was the only possibility she had allowed herself to consider during the last two days. The other option was too immense to give serious thought to.

"I'm glad to hear you've been so practical and patient," the Headmaster said. "For my part, I have determined the appropriate spells that will tell me whether your actions were necessary, or whether this is your new home." His face softened at her wince, and he placed on old, wrinkled hand on hers where it rested above the covers. "I, too, am hoping that we will be able to send you back home swiftly," he said softly, "but we must also be prepared for other outcomes."

She swallowed and nodded. "I'm ready," she said, not feeling ready at all.

The Headmaster began murmuring incantations over her head, creating a colorful web of spell-work that slid and wove together in intricate patterns. Looking at the patterns too long made her feel dizzy, and her eyes slipped closed as the web grew around her. Her thoughts drifted, alighting with a mix of hope and fear on the memories of her best friends. Ron and Harry must have been so worried about her. They had always watched out for each other, and now she might be trapped somewhere they could never reach. If she was stuck here, it would be no different to them than if she had died. Depending on how far back she was, they may not even have been born here.

Tears collected at the corners of her eyes, and she angrily swiped at them. No use dwelling on what might be, before she had a definite answer, she told herself, desperately clawing back some hope. It _was_ still possible that she could go home.

She was so deep in her thoughts that she didn't even notice when the spells ended. The Headmaster's gentle touch against her hand brought her back to her current situation.

His eyes weren't twinkling.

"What are the results?" she asked, voice almost a whisper as her mind remained caught on the flat look in his normally bright blue eyes. "Can I go home?"

His face was too grave. She knew the answer even before he spoke, but her mind rebelled. "No, my dear," he said, as her thoughts became a maelstrom of conflicting fears and ideas, "I am afraid your arrival has torn this time from your own. There is no path back to your original time. I could not find even the smallest thread still connecting the two timelines."

Hermione buried her face in her hands, hiccupping sobs shaking her shoulders and threatening to overwhelm her. "What do I do now?" she managed to ask between her tears, her voice muffled by her palms. She couldn't bear to look at the Headmaster as he replied.

"Because you are in this time, I believe the best course of action is to build yourself a life here. I understand it will be difficult, but it is better to live with sorrow than wallow alone in the dark."

"What year is it?" She had done her level best to avoid that bit of knowledge, but now she had to know.

"It is July 1st, 1997," he replied.

Three years before either of her best friends would even be born. Four years before Harry's parents were fated to die at Voldemort's hand. They would be arriving to the castle to complete their last year at Hogwarts in barely a month. _Professor Snape_ would be among their classmates. Professor Lupin, too, and Peter Pettigrew, the Death Eater no one saw coming. It was overwhelming, and utterly mad.

"May I ask," the Headmaster said, breaking into her whirling thoughts, "how old you are? I did not wish to dig that deeply when I confirmed your tale the other day. Are you still in Hogwarts, or have you graduated already?"

Hermione had to take several deep breaths before she could answer. "I haven't completed my seventh year," she said, honestly. "I'm eighteen, but there were... circumstances, that prevented me from attending my last year of school."

The Headmaster hummed. "Would you be willing to discuss these circumstances with me, tomorrow?" he asked. She finally looked at him, surprise written across her face.

"I have gathered that your timeline was not without conflict and pain," he elaborated. "I am curious to learn why, and perhaps we can consider altering some events, if it seems prudent."

"You want to change the future?" she asked, gaping at him. "I thought that was the absolute _last_ thing anyone should ever do! It's against every rule there is!"

Professor Dumbledore smiled gently at her. "It against the rules to cut a new timeline, which is the only safe method of altering the future, as it allows you to create a new future while your original one continues on intact. You will not be able to change anything for the loved ones you left behind, but since paradoxes are rendered out of the equation by this fact, you can change things for the versions of your loved ones that will exist here."

Hermione gulped and nodded, understanding. She _had_ thought about it, briefly, her first night here. Harry could have his parents back. Sirius and Remus could live happier lives, and not die so young. Ron would never have to lose his brother. All she had to do was tell this version of Albus Dumbledore about the Horcruxes, and how to find and destroy them. Voldemort could be rendered immortal before he ever had a chance to destroy the lives of so many people she loved, and so many others she had never met but who nevertheless deserved to grow and live in peace.

"I think," she said, feeling almost crushed beneath the weight of the words she was about to speak. "I think that we have a lot to discuss, tomorrow."

"By the way," she said, after a few seconds of silence, "my name is Hermione Granger. I'm a muggleborn, and I won't be born for two more years."

HPHPHP

The next day arrived too slowly and all too soon at the same time. Hermione hadn't slept all night after Madam Clawrson retired to bed. Instead, her time had been spent furiously writing out lists on the parchment that a house-elf had sent her, at Madam Clawrson's request.

The lists contained everything she thought would be relevant during her discussion. There was a list of the Horcruxes, of course, including where they were hidden, the protective enchantments she was aware of, and how each had been destroyed. Another list contained all the Death Eaters she knew of, now and in the future, and which ones had defected or might defect. She still didn't know what to think about Professor Snape. The events surrounding his death had happened so quickly, and she had had so many other things to worry about at the time, that she'd never had time to really sit down with Harry and find out exactly what happened.

He went under the "maybe" column.

A third list contained the most painful names – the names of the dead. Many who had died she didn't know, and she mourned their silent losses as much as the rest. The names she could list, however, filled over two feet of parchment. Part of the reason for the length was the other information she had included, information on when and where and how they had died, as well as she knew. Some of the information came from history books, some from Harry, and some, the most painful to write down, from her own observations. She put current Order members she knew of at the top of the list, those who would die in the next few years. They were the most important to start with she figured, if she wanted to save anyone at all. 

She was grateful she had spent so much time reading old newspapers from the first war while on the run with Harry and Ron. Ron had scoffed at her, telling her that there was no use dwelling on the dead of decades past when people were dying again, _then_ , but she had hoped to glean knowledge on Voldemort's typical methods and MO. Now, she was able to recall the names of most of the wizards and witches he had killed, and when they had died. Some were dead already, gone before her arrival, but others could be saved.

The final, unfinished list simply contained a timeline of her life. That one was for her, mostly. She would never return to her old life, but she couldn't bear the thought of forgetting any of it. Already, she had discovered imperfections and holes in her memories of her childhood, gaps that grew larger the further back she tried to go.

In the end, she was forced to halt her scribbling when morning sunlight began to stream across the floor. She had agreed to meet the Headmaster before breakfast, and already Madam Clawrson was awake and striding across the infirmary with, she recognized with a jolt, the robes she had arrived in.

"I see you're already awake," Madam Clawrson said briskly, as Hermione scrambled to organize her notes and set them on the bedside table. The mediwitch performed her usual diagnostic spell, and pronounced Hermione right as rain. The lingering exhaustion to her magical core from the time travel had almost fully healed, and all of her cuts and bruises had been gone by the second day of her stay. "Miss Granger," the mediwitch said in a softer voice than usual when Hermione came back from changing into proper robes behind a curtain, "I am sorry about your circumstances. You are always welcome to talk to me, if you need someone." Her face and voice were gentle, kind, and too much for Hermione to bear.

"Thank you," she choked out. "But I need to go before I'm late to meet with the Headmaster." She gathered up her notes and clutched them to her chest like a shield.

"Of course," the mediwitch replied, too much understanding in her gray eyes. "Well, you have been a model patient, and while I'm never _sad_ , per say, to see a student leave my care in good health, I have appreciated your excellent behavior."

The words were stilted, but Hermione could tell the sentiment was genuine, and she made an effort to smile back at Madam Clawrson. "I do appreciate your care, too," she said. They looked at each other for a few awkard moments, before Madam Clawrson cleared her throat. She mumbled something about work to get back to, and turned with a swish of cream-colored robes to disappear back into her office.

Hermione took a deep breath, steeled herself for the upcoming conversation that needed to happen, and set off to meet the Headmaster and change the future for the loved ones she may never see again.

The Headmaster had told her the password the previous day: Ice Mice. She mumbled it to the imposing statues in front of his office with unease and excitement both swirling through the mess of nervous butterflies flocking in her stomach. She barely registered the revolving staircase that took her up to his door, and knocked with trembling hands. Three breathless seconds passed, and then the door swung open, her Headmaster standing on the other side with his familiar twinkling blue eyes.

"Ah, Miss Granger, right on time," he said, smiling.

"Headmaster, um, Professor Dumbledore," she replied. He quirked a friendly brow at her stumbling words, and stepped back to wave her inside his office.

It was just as Harry had described it. Cluttered with strange devices, books, parchment, and small bowls of candy on every available surface, including parts of the floor. Fawkes glanced up from his golden perch as she entered the room. A single beady black eye bore into her brown ones, and then he tucked his head back under one brilliantly scarlet wing to continue sleeping. The Headmaster conjured two comfortable squashy armchairs for them to sit in, rather than retreating behind his enormous wooden desk, and propped his chin on his clasped hands to observe her. She stood for a moment in uncertainty beside the door, and then perched gingerly at the edge of the chair he gestured her to.

"There is no need to be afraid," he said, his voice as gentle and soothing, as stable and certain as ocean waves upon the beach. In spite of herself, Hermione felt the tension unwinding from her shoulders and spine. "There we go my dear," he said, lips quirking upwards in another grin, "now you look much more comfortable."

She breathed, letting the tension go, and stared down at her notes. He was right. Fear wasn't going to help her, not here. The information she had was full of terrible things, but she could not let that fear rule her. She was a Gryffindor, for Merlin's sake. Bravery was in her blood. With another deep breath, she forced herself to look up, directly into the eyes of the Headmaster, and said, "In my time, Voldemort was still active, but I know how to defeat him."

HPHPHP

Several hours and much discussion later, Hermione sipped from a glass of water to sooth her hoarse throat while the Headmaster paged through her notes once more.

"This information is remarkably thorough," he said, pausing on the page detailing the Horcruxes. His fingers trembled slightly. Hermione wondered, not for the first time, if he had even suspected something like this, so far back. Most of the talking had been done by her, the Headmaster as usual keeping many of his thoughts and reactions to himself.

"I cannot imagine the difficulties and dangers you have suffered through," he added, glancing at her over the top of his half-moon spectacles. "What you describe in these notes...." he trailed off, running one thin finger over the description of the ring Horcrux with a strange look in his eyes. "Well," he finally continued, jerking himself out of whatever thoughts had captivated his attention, "it is more than any student, any child, should have to bear." His face looked unusually pale and gray, the twinkle once more long gone from his eyes. "Nevertheless, I must ask if you are willing to help take on this task again, of finding and destroying Horcruxes. Of course," he added hastily, "I shall do the majority of the legwork, but I suspect that your continued assistance could prove invaluable."

The answer was the easiest thing Hermione had said all day. "Of course. Ron and I promised Harry we would help him destroy the Horcruxes. Just because I'm back in time and neither of them is born yet, that doesn't change _my_ promise. I _want_ to be involved."

"Then," the Headmaster said, finally setting aside her notes, "we must come up with an appropriate story for you. There is no doubt that if Voldemort knew what information you possess, he would certainly try to kill you. Therefore, telling anyone but the most trustworthy about your existence is out of the question."

Hermione nodded in understanding. "How are we supposed to hide the fact that I've appeared out of nowhere?" she asked. It was a question that had been bothering her all night, one she had not managed to solve during all of her note-writing. No matter what lie she came up with, it would be suspicious to someone, and easily unraveled in the end.

"Have you heard of the Dagworth-Grangers?" the Headmaster asked.

Hermione frowned in confusion. "Of course," she said slowly, not sure where the Headmaster was going. "Hector Dagworth-Granger founded the Most Extraordinary Society of Potioneers. But none of that family was in the Order, as far as I know. They're a pureblood family, if not one of the Sacred 28, and they mostly stayed out of the war, didn't they?"

Dumbledore regarded her gravely. "Indeed, most of Hector's remaining siblings and their children have maintained neutrality or left the country entirely. However, he had one son, Humphrey, who has taken the private nature of the Dagwarth-Granger family to an extreme. Little is known about him beyond the academic papers he publishes, as he has been housebound ever since a bout of dragonpox he suffered as a child, and few people have ever been to his home. His wife, however, was an Auror, one of those recently killed in the latest attack."

Hermione gasped. She _had_ read about that attack. It had occurred less than a month before her arrival in this time, but the only article she had managed to find on it gave only the number of Aurors killed, five, rather than their names. "Poor Mr. Dagworth-Granger," she said, wondering how the man was doing. She frowned, "But, I still don't see how this is relevant."

"Mr. Dagworth-Granger was not in the Order," the Headmaster said, leaning back in his chair and steepling his fingers in front of his face, "but he is a friend of mine, and he bore no love for Voldemort even before the murder of his wife, Regina. He is used to keeping close secrets, and I believe that if I reached out to him, he would be willing to adopt you and claim your previous schooling under his own tutelage. The entire family is notorious for valuing their privacy, so it would not be _entirely_ impossible for the most private member of all to have a heretofore unknown child. One who is now attending Hogwarts because he fears for her safety after her mother's death at Voldemort's hands."

Hermione gaped at him. "You think he will be willing to adopt me? But I'm a total stranger! Are you sure of this idea?"

"As sure as I ever am," the Headmaster replied. "I believe it may be best to wrap up or conversation for the day, and I shall begin drafting a correspondence to Humphrey."

"Alright," Hermione said, considering the idea. "If it works, I suppose it will be worth it."

"Quite right, my dear." Professor Dumbledore hummed again, a little bit of the twinkle returning to his eyes. "Now, on unrelated but no less important matters, we must find you a place to stay before term starts. I assume you had already been sorted, in your own time?"

Hermione nodded. "I was in Gryffindor," she said.

Professor Dumbledore clapped his hands. "Then it should be no trouble to tell everyone you've been sorted there in this timeline. If you are happy to remain in the same house?" Hermione nodded again. "Perfect. I believe there is not currently a password, as there are no students in the castle over the summer. I shall accompany you to the tower and speak to the Fat Lady, that we might establish one. And then you may set yourself up in the seventh year girl's dormitory, since you will be staying there anyone once term begins. Tomorrow, I can loan you some coins from the Hogwarts funds and you can go shopping for anything you need in Hogsmeade."

"Thank you, sir," Hermione said. She worried her bottom lip between her teeth, and then broached a second subject she had been worrying about. "Sir, did I arrive with any of my things besides my clothes?" she asked, finally. Though she had been given her wand after her first conversation with the Headmaster, and was grateful to have it with her, she had not seen her beaded bag.

"I believe Madam Clawrson was supposed to have returned your wand after we first spoke," the Headmaster said, his brown wrinkling in concern.

"Yes," Hermione assured him hastily, "she did! However, I had a bag with me, a beaded one, on the small side. It, um, contained several things that were important to me."

Harry had worn the invisibility cloak to his confrontation with Voldemort, but the Marauder's Map, all her books, and Phineas' portrait had all been in the bag, not to mention the only mementos she now had of her friends and family. She had saved a few pictures of her parents after sending them to Australia (and she _did_ hope that Harry and Ron would find them, in the timeline she could not return to), as well as pictures of herself with her friends, a few of her and Ginny together, and one of her with her dorm mates from the Yule Ball, when Parvati had gotten tipsy on spiked punch during the dance and demanded they all cluster in for a photograph.

Professor Dumbledore looked nearly as surprised as he had when she first laid out all her knowledge on Voldemort and his Horcruxes. "My dear girl," he said, apology thick in his voice, "please forgive an old man his forgetfulness. I have had your bag in my office since I found you, in case you turned out to be dangerous. I must confess I quite forgot about it in light of your other confessions."

A relieved smile broke across Hermione's face. "That's quite alright," she said, as he retrieved it by hand and returned it to her. A small weight seemed to lift from her shoulders as soon as the deceptively light bag was back in her hands. "Thank you," she said, sincerely.

She didn't let go of the bag on the entire walk to Gryffindor tower. Before she requested dinner from the house-elves and retired to bed, she double-checked all the protection charms. Each one was still in place, much to her continued relief. Finally, she placed several more protection charms on the bottom drawer of her nightstand and deposited the bag softly inside.

After eating, she lay on her side, staring at the innocuous drawer that contained all her ties to her past life. Exhaustion crept over her slowly, and she drifted into a slumber disturbed with disjointed dreams of Voldemort and strangers and her friends calling for her from behind closed doors. She would be grateful to only remember flashes of the dreams the next day.


	4. Chapter 3

The Headmaster called Hermione to his office again the next day. When she arrived, she was surprised to find Professor McGonagall waiting in an armchair next to his desk. Her old head of house stood as she entered the office, extending a hand to the time traveler. "Miss Granger," she said, voice stiff even as her face folded with concern, "Albus has filled me in on your situation and your, ah, uniquely helpful information."

Hermione grasped Professor McGonagall's hand, a wave of relief welling up inside of her as she realized that she would not be quite as alone as she had thought. Her friends were not yet born, and her parents wouldn't know her from Adam, but that didn't mean she was entirely without friendly faces. The Headmaster hadn't entirely counted in her mind, having always been halfway to myth in her head ever since her eleven-year-old self had first read of his multitude of accomplishments and titles.

"Professor," Hermione said smiling, "I'm glad you're here."

The professor looked at the Headmaster, exchanging a glance Hermione couldn't read. When she turned back to Hermione, however, her gaze was open and kind. "I am here to escort you to Diagon Alley to purchase your school things for the coming year," she said, pulling a bag from her pocket. "As an orphan," she paused briefly over the word before soldiering forwards, "you are entitled to a student allowance from school funds. Anyone in your situation would receive the same assistance, so I don't want to hear any complaints."

The protests forming on Hermione's tongue died at her professor's words. "Um, thank you," she said instead. "I have a few things with me already, but I do appreciate the help."

Professor McGonagall nodded brusquely. "Excellent. Then, if you have no further questions, I believe we had best be off. There will be more discuss when we return, so let us not waste daylight."

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Shopping in Diagon Alley with Professor McGonagall brought back memories of the summer before Hermione’s first year. She had been so eager to discover the magical world, so eager to finally know that she wasn’t a freak, she was a _witch_. Everything had seemed shiny and amazing to her eleven-year-old eyes. Now, she had seven years of experience living in the magical world, but it still retained a level of wonder that she didn’t think she would ever fully leave behind. And now, she was in the past, and her eyes darted around between the stores and people, cataloguing all the differences she could see. Some stores were different, many were the same. She gripped her wand in her pocket as her head of house lead her past Ollivanders, and smiled sadly when they passed Florean Fortescue’s ice cream shop.

There was an air, in this time, of fear, that reminded her more of the summer before her sixth year than her first, but fewer shops had closed so far than would during the second war. She also recalled that the first war wouldn’t really ramp up until around the time that Harry’s parents finished Hogwarts. It had been shocking, when she realized just how many Order members had died during the year that Voldemort was searching for Harry’s parents, the year before he was temporarily defeated by Lily Potter’s love and sacrifice for her baby. She had wondered then, and wondered again now, if some of those Order members had perished refusing to give up any information regarding the hidden Potter family. If they had died for the hope that Harry would live and save them all. Her friend would probably have hated to learn of her theory. He had always hated his status as the Boy-Who-Lived. Ron had taken a long time to realize that, but Hermione had seen it from the start.

If she could change the course of the war and kill Voldemort before Harry was even born, he would be able to live his greatest dream: growing up as a _normal_ child, unmarked by fame and legends that grew more quickly than he did.

“We shall pick up your school books first, if that is alright with you,” Professor McGonagall said, breaking Hermione from her reverie. She looked up, realizing that they were in front of the bookshop.

“Of course,” she said, fingers already itching to run through the books she could see lining the shelves through the windows. “Do you have my school list?”

“I have it here,” Professor McGonagall said, pulling a few sheets of parchment from a pocket of her robes. “What NEWT courses do you plan on taking? The Headmaster informed me that you were a bright girl who struck him as disinclined to lie, but if you do sign on for NEWTs you aren’t prepared for, the only one to suffer will be yourself.”

“Of course I won’t lie!” Hermione said indignantly. “I worked very hard for my grades and am taking a lot of NEWTs, but I wouldn’t take ones I was incapable of completing.” It did worry her, a bit, that she had spent a whole year out of school. She was almost certainly rusty on anything that wasn’t protective charms, defense, and runes related to warding. However, she was sure she could catch up on anything that had started to go fuzzy in her mind. “I’m taking Charms, Defense Against the Dark Arts, Herbology, Transfiguration, Arithmancy, Ancient Runes, and Potions.”

Her head of house raised an impressed eyebrow at Hermione when she finished her list. “Well, you must be a very bright girl to take such an intensive list of NEWT courses.” She tapped her wand against the second page of parchment and handed it to Hermione. As she watched, her courses appeared on the page, with the requisite course book appearing next to each one. Several books were ones she recognized. She had done a little researching ahead in some of her courses during her sixth year, and hoped it would offset any rusting of her skills.

A soft sigh left Hermione’s lungs as they entered the bookstore, taking with it a small piece of the weight that had been crushing her ever since the Headmaster’s pronouncement that she was stuck here, in this time. Books had been her first and friends in her childhood. No matter what time she was in, no matter what else was happening, books were a constant in her life. Doorways to knowledge that broadened her mind and swept her away from the troubles in her life, to a place where only the words on the page and the spells on her tongue mattered. She drifted away from Professor McGonagall, fingers trailing along wooden shelves smooth with age, and contemplated where to begin her search for new books to comfort her in this new time.

Her schoolbooks were easy to find. Course books for Hogwarts students were always near the front of the shop and prominently displayed, but once she had them collected in a magically lightened bag, she found herself wandering between shelves further back, looking at theoretical charms and transfiguration books that caught her eye, before moving to books on defensive spells that could be useful if she were going to help the Headmaster track down the Horcruxes in this new time. Professor McGonagall had stayed in the transfiguration section, only telling Hermione to find her when she was ready to check out, and admonishing her not to stay too long, as they still had other shopping to do. That, she knew, wouldn’t be as much of a problem this year as in past years; as she looked through the shelves, she was acutely aware of her lack of funds. She didn’t want to stress her budget too much, as she was aware of her dependence on the school’s generosity for now. It grated on her, somewhat, but there was nothing else she could do. Her beaded bag had run out of coins long before she and Ron and Harry had completed their quest, and she couldn’t exactly get a job before she even had an identity in this time period.

She selected one book on high-level charms theory that she hoped would supplement her studies nicely, a thick hardcover book on magical law and the current political climate in the Wizengamot she could use later, if she still intended to go into magical law and campaign for rights for magical creatures, and a book on rare curses and counter-curses that she thought could be useful during Horcrux hunting. Finally, she arrived in front of the section on potions theory, debating whether or not one more book would be alright. Though potions had never been her favorite subject, the bullying she had endured from Professor Snape turning her off of her natural love of learning in all areas, she had been quite irritated during her sixth year to find Harry constantly outdoing her with the Half-Blood Prince’s book. There was clearly a great deal of potions-making that wasn’t in their course books, and she didn’t want to end up with another year of mediocre potions. Not to mention, understanding potions a bit better might help with identifying the potion Harry had spoken of, that had incapacitated Professor Dumbledore and allowed Professor Snape to kill him.

Finally, she grabbed the book with a huff and stuffed it into her bag with the rest. It could never hurt to be more prepared.

She found Professor McGonagall in a cozy chair by the transfiguration section where they had parted ways. The professor eyed her bulging bag but said nothing, only rising gracefully from her chair and gesturing them towards the checkout. “Are you buying something too?” Hermione asked, looking at the book her head of house had failed to return to the shelves.

“One can never stop learning about one’s field,” Professor McGonagall said austerely. “This is a new book by Headley Brimstone, one of _the_ top transfiguration specialists of our time. I suspect the Headmaster could have outdone him, if he had devoted himself to research, and possibly still could even now if he ever decided he wanted to, but other than Albus, Brimstone is the leading expert in the field.” She smiled at Hermione in contrast to her tone, and Hermione smiled back. It was good to know that even older Hogwarts professors could still learn new things. To reach the peak of one’s learning and be able to go no further seemed like a sad fate that Hermione never wanted to achieve.

The two women paid for their books and returned to the alley. After the dim interior of the bookshop, Hermione’s eyes needed a moment to adjust to the bright sunny day. Not a cloud marred the hard blue sky overhead, and Hermione directed her gaze at the ground while her eyes adjusted. As such, she didn’t see the person right in her path until she had bumped into him.

“Oh!” she exclaimed, gripping her books to her chest so as not to drop them. “I’m sorry! I didn’t see you.” She raised her eyes to the person in front of her, and had to hold back a gasp.

The boy in front of her couldn’t be anyone else but Sirius Black’s younger brother, Regulus Arcturus Black. The same man who would one day give his life to steal one of Voldemort’s Horcruxes, all for the sake of his house elf. His gray eyes took in her appearance with mild curiosity from beneath dark brows. His smooth black hair would have fallen nearly to his shoulders, were it not held back at the nape of his neck in a leather band, and his entire appearance was impeccable. Hermione felt rather shabby standing in front of him. She still hadn’t had a chance to buy new robes, and had only scourgified the clothes she had arrived in that morning to make them suitable to wear again. Her own hair was held back with a hair tie, but as usual quite a few curly strands had escaped almost immediately to fly around her face and stick out in all directions.

In an additional unnerving fact, he looked so much like the pictures she had seen of a young Sirius that she couldn't help but stare with wide eyes. They wouldn't exactly pass for twins, but they shared similar sharp facial features, and pale skin beneath dark hair that they both seemed to like pairing with dark robes. Their expressions were also not so far off as they probably would have wanted. Sirius had always had an air of arrogance around him, and a depth to his eyes that spoke of secrets always carefully guarded behind walls that few others could penetrate.

They were also both very attractive as young men, but she banished that thought as quickly as it arrived.

“It’s alright,” he said in response to her flustered apology. He held out his hand. “My name is Regulus Black. I don’t believe I’ve met you before.” He barely spared a glance for Professor McGonagall, standing next to Hermione and watching the meeting with narrowed eyes.

“Hermione, um, Hermione Dagworth-Granger,” Hermione said, taking his hand in a brief handshake. His skin was warm and smooth, nails perfectly groomed and grip firm but polite. His gaze had sharpened at her name, but he said nothing as she continued rambling out her fake backstory. “Sorry, yes. I’ve been homeschooled before this year, but with recent events, my father thought it best to have me complete my final year of schooling at Hogwarts. Professor McGonagall was kind enough to accompany me to shop for school supplies, as my father finds it difficult to leave his house.” She was extremely grateful that Professor Dumbledore had already provided her with a cover story. Otherwise, her inability to say anything about her background would have marked her as suspicious before the school year even began.

Regulus regarded her with hooded, unreadable eyes. “I was sorry to hear of your mother,” he said after a few moments, sounding, shockingly, as though he genuinely cared. “Your family is well known among those with any interest in the art of potions, and the loss of any member of a good family is a tragic occurrence.”

_Oh,_ she thought, a bit meanly. _Of course he only cares that ‘pure’ blood was spilled, and pure blood from a family of intelligent people at that._ Nevertheless, she did her best to smile at him, deciding that he would chalk any falseness in the expression up to her grief at her ‘mother’s’ recent death. He had at least not mentioned the fact that her existence wouldn't have been known to anyone following her family. She was grateful at least for the lack of questioning, if suspicious as well. “Thank you for your concern,” she said, letting her smile fad slightly. “I appreciate the sentiment.”

She was grateful to feel Professor McGonagall’s hand land on her shoulder before the conversation could continue. “If you’ll excuse us, Mr. Black,” the professor said, voice polite but not warm, “Miss Dagworth-Granger still has a great deal of shopping to attend to. I’m sure there will be more time to chat and get to know each other once term begins.”

“Of course,” Regulus nodded at the professor. “I hope I didn’t bother you overly much.” He inclined his head in her direction as well. “Professor. Miss Dagworth-Granger.” And then he was sweeping gracefully around them and disappearing into the throngs of witches and wizards that filled the alley.

“I suppose you know of his family, and who he is,” Professor McGonagall said, leading Hermione by the hand on her shoulder towards the potions supply store across the street. “He is a smart boy, but I despair for his future. With the family he has, and lacking his brother’s rebellious nature, it is likely he will end up on the opposite side of this war from you.” The professor’s voice was heavy, genuine sorrow for the fate she saw laid out in front of one of her brightest students.

Hermione bit her lip, remaining quiet. Professor McGonagall had no idea how aware she was of the Black family’s dark tendencies, but she also apparently did not know what the youngest member of the family was going to do, one day. Hermione resisted the urge to crane her neck in the direction Regulus had disappeared and find the boy again. He hadn’t succeeded in destroying any Horcruxes, but the very fact that he had left Voldemort’s ranks to try gave Hermione hope that he could be swayed earlier. He may be a bit pompous now, but that did not negate the sacrifice he would be capable of making. She felt a clenching pain in her chest every time she thought of the young Black’s fate, of how horrifying it must have been to die alone in that cave, dragged beneath the cold black water by the grasping fingers of a thousand rotting Inferi.

She tried to put those thoughts out of her head as she once more left the sunny alley for the cool dark of another store for school supplies. Even as she browsed through bins of foul smelling pus, hard rattling seeds, dried magical vegetables, and other assorted potions ingredients, her mind wandered back to Regulus Black. He didn’t fade entirely from her thoughts until she and Professor McGonagall were done with her shopping, in fact. They were exiting Madam Malkin’s, Hermione finally in possession of enough new robes to last her through the school year, when Professor McGonagall paused and looked at Hermione with a smile. “It’s been a long day,” she said, gesturing to all the bags that loaded down Hermione’s arms, even with lightening charms. “How would you like to grab a bite to eat at the Leakey Cauldron before we return to the castle?”

The sun was getting low in the sky to the west, shadows stretching across the alley before them. “That sounds lovely,” Hermione said. She readjusted her grip on a bag that was slipping down her arm and followed her head of house to the pub, feeling a bit like a drunkard as she wove through the crowd and tried not to let any bags fall. A grateful sigh escaped her lungs when they finally reached the pub and acquired a table.

It was a little bit strange to eat dinner with her professor, and Hermione was still feeling out of sorts from her earlier encounter, leaving her head a muddle and her conversational skills lacking. They ordered food, and then lapsed into a silence that Hermione, at least, found a bit uncomfortable. At one point, she gathered her courage and asked the professor about life in the castle over the summer. “I’ve never been there when it wasn’t full of students, before,” she said, recalling how empty and echoing it had felt ever since her arrival. “Do all the professors stay in the castle, or do most of you have homes you go to when classes aren’t in session?”

Professor McGonagall raised an eyebrow at her and pursed her lips in thought. “I have a house elsewhere in Scotland,” the professor said, “one that I inherited from my family. However, I don’t often use it. Most of us who have been around long enough find it easier to make the castle our permanent home. Several of us even find the quiet comforting, when the students are gone, and there is always Hogsmeade nearby if we wish to socialize with others beyond our academic walls.”

Hermione nodded. It made sense, but Hermione had already run out of questions. It seemed even battling Death Eaters and living on the run for a year hadn’t taken away her anxiety when it came to making small talk with professors. The meal passed mostly in silence after her attempt at conversation, and soon it was time to return to the castle for the evening. Professor McGonagall offered to side-along her, and she gratefully accepted. She was still somewhat more tired than usual, she had realized over the course of a day spend walking all over Diagon Alley. So she took the arm her professor offered, and let herself be pulled along as they apparated to Hogsmeade to begin yet another walk from the village to the castle.

Hermione’s gaze drifted up towards the darkening sky. Already, the sun was low, shadows from the castle and the Forbidden Forest and the tall wall around the grounds all casting their own eerie shadows across the grounds. She remembered the last time she had approached Hogwarts from Hogsmeade, right before battle and death and the curse that had dragged her forever from the only life she ever knew. She shuddered, pulling her robes closer around herself. It was good to enter the castle, where the familiar stone walls bore down on her like a comforting blanket. _You are safe, you are safe,_ the walls almost seemed to whisper, and for the space of the walk between the front hall and the Headmaster’s office, she allowed herself to believe it.

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Having regained some of her equilibrium during the walk through the castle, Hermione was discussing her upcoming classes with Professor McGonagall as they entered the Headmaster's office. She was feeling calmer as they followed her head of house into the office, but her voice cut off abruptly when she caught sight of the object gleaming dully on a space cleared in the center of the massive desk.

"That's Ravenclaw's diadem!" she exclaimed. Professor Dumbledore chuckled at her.

"Yes," he said, far too calmly. "It is. I retrieved it today from the Room of Requirement while you were out with Minerva. Now, if you are feeling up to it, I was hoping you would both accompany me to destroy it."

"What?" Hermione said faintly, still staring at the diadem.

"Your notes said that either Fiendfyre or Basilisk venom would destroy the foul things." She glanced at the Headmaster, nodding. "I went through a few of my own books as well while you were out, and the information holds true as far as I can determine. Since we do not currently have Basilisk venom on hand, I felt Fiendfyre was the best way to proceed."

"We're going to destroy it now?" she asked, astonished that any part of her quest could be completed so quickly. In her original timeline, it had taken them the entire year to figure out where this Horcrux had been hidden. But of course, she reminded herself, Professor Dumbledore hadn't had to stumble through the dark with only the barest of guiding lines. He had been able to use her notes to find it immediately, and he was an accomplished enough wizard not to fear the Fiendfyre curse as she and her fellow seventeen-year-old best friends had.

"No time like the present," the Headmaster said cheerfully. "I would be quite happy to remove this cursed thing from my school as swiftly as possible."

"Are you sure you want to include Miss Granger?" Professor McGonagall asked from behind Hermione. Hermione frowned. She had destroyed or helped destroy Horcruxes in her own time already. It was dangerous, and could be terrible, but she wasn't an innocent child.

As though sensing the direction of her thoughts, the Headmaster nodded to her with a solemn look on his face. "Miss Dagworth-Granger," he said, placing a slight emphasis on her new fake name, "has experience in this matter that we do not. I think it would be wise to include her."

Professor McGonagall put up a few more protests, but in the end Hermione accompanied them both out of the castle, the diadem twinkling innocently in Professor Dumbledore's gloved hand.

"Where are we going?" she asked, as they began to skirt the edges of the Black Lake.

The Headmaster turned his twinkling blue gaze on her, and smiled. "My dear girl," he said, "These grounds contain many secrets, and not all can be discovered by students. Come."

He offered her the hand not holding the Horcrux, and she took it hesitantly. Professor McGonagall reached for their joined hands as well, and Hermione realized that there was a small bead in the Headmaster's hand. A Portkey, she realized a moment later, when the familiar tug jerked behind her navel.

For just a moment, Hermione panicked. Memories of the Battle at Hogwarts flooded her mind, and she felt once again the spell hitting the time turner around her neck, and the viciously implacable pull of time dragging her the wrong direction. Then, the motion around her stopped, and she dropped to her knees on hard stone, breathing heavily as she reminded herself that she hadn't time traveled again.

"Are you okay?" a voice near her asked, a hand coming to rest on her shoulder. She startled, but it was only Professor McGonagall.

"Yes," she said, still a little bit breathless. "I'm okay! Sorry, I just wasn't expecting that."

Her head of house glared at the Headmaster. "Perhaps a better warning would not go amiss next time you Portkey a student," she told him. He had the grace to look abashed, but quickly moved on.

"We are now in a cave beneath the far side of the Black Lake," the Headmaster told her. Looking around, she realized that they were entirely underground. Stone walls stretched around them, lit by a faint glow whose origin she couldn't make out. "This place is only accessible to a select few. Without a Portkey held and activated by myself as the current Headmaster of Hogwarts, you would not be able to come here. However, it is also a space full of old magic, and thus, I believe, the perfect spot for disposing of something as dark and unpleasant as a Horcrux that was poisoning the halls of my school."

He laid the diadem gently on the ground in the center of the cave, and stepped back quickly.

"Now," he said, glancing at Hermione, "you said you had encountered Fiendfyre before?"

"Yes," Hermione said. She heard him ask something else, but her gaze was caught on the glittering diadem, gleaming innocently in the faint light of the cave, beautiful against the cold, uncaring stone. _Such a shame,_ whispered a voice at the back of her mind, _to destroy such an invaluable artifact._ The voice had a point.

Ravenclaw's lost diadem could mean so much to so many historians, not to mention the magical properties it supposedly had, magic that could grant anyone who wore it wisdom beyond the understanding of regular men. _Perhaps there is another way,_ the voice spoke again. _It doesn't_ have _to be destroyed._

"No," Hermione whispered in agreement, "there _must_ be another way."

She didn't even notice that she had moved closer to the diadem, until a shout from Professor McGonagall and an iron grip around her arm dragged her back. "What were you doing?" her head of house demanded, her stern voice torn between anger and fear. "It looked like you intended to grab it, right before the Headmaster cast a curse that could kill every one of us if we aren't careful." The professor's grip was painful around her arm, and suddenly Hermione realized just how close she had come to screwing everything up immediately.

It felt like a veil had been lifted from her eyes, and the diadem no longer looked innocent or pretty. Instead, it looked sinister, each glittering jewel like an eye watching her, tracking her and delving for weaknesses to use against her.

"The Horcrux is fighting back," she gasped, throwing herself backwards and dragging McGonagall with her. "It wants to save itself, they all try to save themselves, and it will get into your mind if you let it. We have to destroy it quickly!" Professor McGonagall let go of Hermione and stared at her hand, shock entering her eyes as she realized just how hard she had been gripping her student, how close she had come to losing control in her fear.

There was fear, for once, in the Headmaster's eyes as well. Hermione wondered, briefly, if it had said anything to him. But there were more important matters at hand, and she straightened up, making her voice as firm as possible. "Headmaster Dumbledore," she said in the authoritative voice she used to lecture Harry and Ron about unfinished homework, "It must be destroyed immediately. Can you cast the curse?"

He nodded once at her, and gestured for her and Professor McGonagall to back up to the edges of the cave. They did so, not daring to look directly at the diadem again as the Headmaster drew his magic together in the incantation for one of the most dangerous and deadly curses there was. He cast the curse in a voice like thunder, and a fiery dragon burst from his wand, twisting and writhing for a few tense, trembling moments, before it straightened out and dove right for the Horcrux now smoking against the stone floor.

A hideous shriek rent the air as the flames touched the diadem. The sound tore through Hermione, dragging her to her knees again as she slammed her hands over her ears. It was worse than hearing it in the Room of Requirements, she would have sworn it. The shriek was everything cold and dark in the world become sound, loneliness and fear and pain and _rage_ beyond comprehension burned into a single endless noise that was almost unbearable.

She didn't realize she was crying until Professor McGonagall helped her off the floor and handed her a handkerchief, asking questions she only half heard. When her vision stopped swimming with the fading echoes of the scream against her mind, she saw the Headmaster swaying against the far wall.

"What happened?" she asked, looking towards the diadem's resting place. All that remained was a smear of blackened stone and a few bits of ash.

"The Horcrux is destroyed," the Headmaster said, pushing himself off the wall. "And I must admit, it was far more draining a task than I anticipated, both physically _and_ mentally." He looked at Hermione, locking gazes with her. "If you had not been here to help pull us from its thrall, I shudder to think what may have happened."

Hermione shivered, but Professor McGonagall, it seemed, had regained her composure. "She should not have been here anyway," the professor protested. "She could have _died_ , Albus."

He shook his head. "We have discussed this enough, Minerva," he said, voice brooking no argument. "If she wishes to be involved, she will be. However, I do think it would be wise to add at least one more person to our party. Destroying this single Horcrux nearly exhausted everything I had."

The trip back to the castle was silent and tense. Both professors had conjured lights from the tips of their wands, the golden glow providing the only light to guide their way through the dark that had fallen during their time in the cave. Even the sky seemed to brood, heavy clouds having moved in to cover the stars and moon. Professor McGonagall refused to allow Hermione to walk back to Gryffindor tower alone one they entered the castle, so she was accompanied by a tall, silent, brooding shadow as she climbed staircase after staircase on shaking limbs. Finally, she reached the Fat Lady's portrait, and her head of house coughed. She laid a hand on Hermione's shoulder, looking a bit awkward but sincere as she spoke. "You don't have to accompany us, you know. Your information has been invaluable, but you have every right not to place yourself in that kind of danger again."

Hermione appreciated her professor's concern, she really did. At the same time, she couldn't imagine being banned from helping to destroy the foul things. She had realized, between leaving the cave and arriving at her dorm, that another tiny weight had disappeared from her shoulders at the sight of the black smudge that was all that remained of the diadem. 

The first Horcrux to be destroyed in this time.

"Thank you," she said, unable to meet her head of house's eyes. "But I would rather keep being involved," she said.

Her head of house was clearly not pleased with her answer, but she could not override the Headmaster and the head of the Light, the leader in the fight against a monster who wanted to destroy their entire world. Finally, she nodded, standing up and folding her arms in her dark green robes. "Well," she said, "you know that you can always talk to me. You are not in this alone."

"I know," Hermione said, managing a smile for her professor. "I won't forget."

That night, her dreams were filled with the voices of her friends, always calling to her just out of sight. No matter how she tried, she could never find them, even as their voices begged for her help. She collapsed eventually, exhausted even in sleep, when a boy with gray eyes appeared from nowhere, in the nature of dreams, and sat down beside her. "Don't worry," he said. "You'll see them again."

She looked at him and he split into three people. A young boy, blithely unaware of what lay before him. A terrified young man, reaching out to her with desperately clawing fingers as slimy hands dragged him into the dark. A man, ravaged by unimaginable pain, watching the two versions of his brother with vague sorrow and pity on his face.

She wouldn't remember much the next morning, only that she awoke with fresh tearstains on her pillow and a renewed commitment to changing the lives of her unborn friends. She would not abandon them, regardless of what toll it demanded of her. She was a Gryffindor after all, and she was not going to let any pain stop her from doing what was right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's one Horcrux down. Don't worry, they won't all be so easy.


	5. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I meant this chapter to go all the way up to the start of term, but then it was getting long and I also wanted the chapters not to vary wildly in length, overall. So I've split it in half, and the second part (now the next chapter) will hopefully be up by tomorrow, but definitely within the next few days at the latest.

A week passed before Hermione was called to the Headmaster's office again.

During that time, Hermione distracted herself from loneliness by reading through several of her textbooks. The second day after destroying the first Horcrux, she began taking detailed notes from the potions theory book she had picked up during her trip to Diagon Alley.  Much to her chagrin, there were a number of places where the course textbook suggested ingredient preparations that her theory book disagreed with.  It also disagreed with a number of methods for creating the potion itself.  Several times, her textbook suggested stirring volatile potions only clockwise, while the theory tome made note of the value of periodic counterclockwise stirs in troublesome and volatile potions for stabilization in the very first chapter.

The differences irked her to no end, and she was furious with her past self for buying into their sixth-year textbook so easily. The more she scribbled down notes, the more her book would have looked like The Half-Blood Prince's (she still had a hard time thinking of it as _Professor Snape's_ ), if she hadn't been civilized enough to write _her_ notes in a separate roll of parchment. By the time a week had passed, she had already taken detailed notes on the first semester's worth of potions and which corrections might need to be applied to the ingredients and methodology.

She did not spend all her time holed up reading, however, as much as a part of her wanted to. Instead, she made a habit of joining Professor McGonagall for tea at least every other day. Her professor seemed happy enough at her company, and she swiftly discovered the well of untapped theoretical knowledge that was her professor. It was almost astonishing, after their first few conversations together, that Hermione hadn't been taking advantage of her professors more often during her original school days. 

A number of rules that she had known, such as the Five Principle Exemptions to Gamp's Law, became clear. A transfigured object always retained a small "memory" of its original form, no matter how powerful the witch or wizard who performed the transfiguration. Therefore, objects such as food could be transfigured into different food to taste better, but any object during digestion was almost certain to revert to its origins. Therefore, food conjured from thin air would have no nutritional value, whereas food conjured from dangerous substances would almost certainly become poisonous once ingested. Conjured money, similarly, was always distinguishable as counterfeit to those who knew how to look. 

The conversations were fascinating, and Hermione made a promise to herself to keep talking to regularly with head of house once the school year began, no matter how busy she became.

Aside from her books and Professor McGonagall, however, Hermione found herself lonely. Burying herself in her books and transfiguration discussions could only distract her so much from thoughts of what she had lost. More than once, she found herself waking in tears, her pillow uncomfortably wet beneath her face as the dreams of her lost friends faded from her mind. Even seeing the dead in the Great Hall had not put such a heavy weight on her chest as knowing that half of them weren't even born yet, that they had not even had a chance to exist at all where she was now. 

The only thing that helped was reminding herself that she was changing things, so that when the _did_ exist, they would not have to die so young. It was a relief, therefore, to be called back to the Headmaster's office a week after her trip to Diagon Alley.

HPHPHP

"The next Horcrux to destroy, I believe, is the ring," the Headmaster said, getting right down to business after they had exchanged a few pleasantries. "We know where it is, and that the protections on it are such that touching it would be deadly disaster. We also know, from last week, that destroying it is more than a matter of simply controlling Fiendfyre."

Professor McGonagall huffed at his word choice, and Hermione agreed. There was no such thing as "simply" controlling Fiendfyre. The Headmaster, however, ignored them.

"I have requested help from another Order member, an Auror who is quite adept at charms and curses." 

With eerily perfect timing, the flames in the fireplace flared bright green, and a new, unfamiliar witch stepped into the room. 

"Hermione, I would like to introduce you to Dorcas Meadows. Dorcas, this is Hermione Dagworth-Granger.“

Dorcas Meadows was a severe looking witch in her mid-twenties, with dirty blond hair cropped short and spiked up on top, a dusting of freckles on her pale cheeks, and features sharp enough to cut glass. She was clearly fit beneath her robes, the gray and blue fabric stretching over her muscular shoulders and parting to reveal comfortable trousers hugging equally muscular thighs.  She eyed Hermione up and down, an inscrutable expression harshening the lines of her face.

“Are you sure this girl can handle hunting Horcruxes, Albus?” she asked drily.  “She barely looks older than my niece.”

Hermione blushed and frowned at the Order member in front of her.  “I can handle myself,” she said, voice only wavering slightly.  “I am well aware of the dangers, and I’ve faced such things before.”

Dorcas still looked skeptical, but did not protest further. Hermione refrained from elaborating on her own past experiences anyway. Professor Dumbledore had not said how much this Auror and Order member knew about her past, and she didn’t want to overshare. 

Dorcas Meadows was a no-nonsense witch with little time for pleasantries, Hermione swiftly learned. The woman laid out the details as she understood them concerning the Horcrux and its protections with near brutal efficiency, and was ready to go out and destroy it before Hermione had even finished processing the rapid-fire pace of her conversation. She wondered, briefly, if this was how Ron and Harry felt when she talked at them about their schoolwork.

"The plan seems sound," Professor Dumbledore said during a break in Dorcas’s monologue, looking to Hermione. "Do you have any information to contradict it?"

"I don't think so," Hermione said, receiving an irritated look from Dorcas. “Auror Meadows and Professor McGonagall will set the wards around the house to protect anything apart from the house being burned, you will control the Fiendfyre with Professor McGonagall's help, and I will be there to assist wherever necessary, including intervening if the Horcrux seems to be affecting anyone’s senses.”

She couldn't help but feel entirely _unnecessary_ beneath the hawk-like gray-blue eyes of Dorcas Meadows. Judging by the look in those eyes, Dorcas agreed with the sentiment.

Professor Dumbledore, however, merely nodded to her with a smile and a twinkle in his eyes. "Then shall we be off?" he said, offering her his left arm. Another Portkey was gripped in his left hand. Hermione couldn’t help but notice it was the same hand that had been cursed, in her original timeline. The same hand on which he had tried to wear the ring. A tremor of unease went through her. It must have been a powerful Horcrux, to convince the Headmaster to put it on his hand without checking thoroughly for traps.

Dorcas and Professor McGonagall each gripped the Portkey, and Hermione took Dumbledore’s arm, twining her wrist to get her own grip. The last thing she saw before the Portkey activated was Professor Dumbledore’s twinkling eyes and Dorcas Meadows’s knife-like frown.

HPHPHP

They landed in a copse of scraggly trees. Once again, Hermione’s knees nearly buckled out from under her, but the Headmaster’s arm around hers kept her upright.

“I believe the house is this way,” the Headmaster said, turning towards what Hermione guessed was north, judging by the sun.

The group walked silently through the trees, the Headmaster occasionally raising his wand to flick away the compulsion charms that kept muggles from stumbling upon the old wizarding house at the edges of their village. Finally, the trees parted, and an old ramshackle wooden shack appeared before them. There was a snake nailed to the door, and Hermione shuddered. Harry had never been very forthcoming with the details of what this place had looked like. Now that she saw it for herself, Hermione couldn’t blame him.

The whole place radiated an aura of darkness. Hermione felt uneasy just standing so close to the home where Tom Riddle’s mother had grown up.

Next to her, Professor Dumbledore showed no signs of the same distress. “I will check that the ring is there,” he said, already striding towards the house. “Meanwhile, Minerva, Dorcas, if you would begin the warding process that would be excellent. Hermione, with me if you please.”

Hermione took several deep breaths and forced her feet to move, following after the Headmaster with much more hesitant steps. Behind her, Professor McGonagall and Dorcas were also following the Headmaster’s request. She recognized several of the wards they were putting up; they were the same sort of wards she had used for protection during her original Horcrux hunt, to hide from Death Eaters. Cold shivers ran down her spine as she got closer to the house.

“There might be wards on the door,” she said, her voice faint and barely audible. Luckily, Professor Dumbledore had already thought that far ahead. He checked first with spells that Hermione knew, and then with several she had never heard of before, and finally the door swung open, revealing the dark mouth of Voldemort’s family home.

“Come,” the Headmaster said. “Let us confirm this Horcrux is here, and then we can leave.”

“Right,” Hermione said. Her whole body felt cold as she stepped past the threshold and glanced around the deceptively unthreatening interior. Cobwebs filled nearly every corner, and ever surface had a fine layer of dust that puffed up into the air to choke them as they walked forward. What furniture there was in the room was decrepit, mouldering and dusty as everything else. A small kitchen on the western side of the from room held a few rusting pots and pans. A coughing fit doubled her over when she stepped further into the room. Professor Dumbledore’s hand on her back stopped her from bolting from the place, and she reminded herself quite firmly that she was a Gryffindor, and one who had faced much worse than this, moreover. Once the dust had cleared from her lungs and eyes, she straightened back up and held one sleeve in front of her face to prevent further fits.

“I don’t know exactly where it was,” she said, voice muffled by her robes. “Just that it was somewhere in the house, and touching it is dangerous.”

Professor Dumbledore swept his wand slowly through the dim, dusty air. A thin trail of blue light followed in the wake of his wand, unchanging until it hit upon a second door in the eastern wall. “I believe the ring is through there,” he said, and his voice was as soft as hers.

They approached the door cautiously, and the Headmaster ran more detection spells over it. 

The room beyond was even more depressing than the kitchen and living room had been. A bed sagged against the far wall, a simple mattress beneath a boarded up window, and a battered chest of drawers tilted precariously into the opposite corner. Together, they made up the only furniture in the room.

A red glow emanated from the top drawer of the dresser, and the Headmaster moved towards it slowly, casting spells to detect curses and traps as he went. Halfway across the room, he stopped abruptly, throwing out an arm to halt Hermione’s slow progress behind him. He muttered a sharp spell that left Hermione breathless with the concussive force released. He almost looked impressed. Hermione was just grateful that she, Harry, and Ron hadn’t been the ones to obtain this particular Horcrux.

“That appears to be the only trap in our way,” the Headmaster said, beckoning her forwards again. “Now all that’s left is to ensure the ring is there, dispel anything nasty on the ring itself, and return to our comrades outside. Hopefully they will have finished all their warding by now.”

The ring was, indeed, nestled in the top drawer, glinting dully in their wandlight against pale wood. Hermione backed up as soon as she caught sight of it, ready to leave immediately. The Headmaster, however, seemed rooted to the spot. An eery gleam had entered his eyes, and he almost seemed to have forgotten Hermione was there.

“Well,” he said, almost to himself. “This is certainly unexpected. How curious, to find that it has been here all this time.”

His left hand, the same one Hermione still remembered blackened and dead, nearly touched the ring before Hermione’s senses caught up with her.

“Professor!” she screamed, hitting his hand away with enough force to knock him sideways.

For one terrible moment, rage bloomed in his eyes, the blue going as dark as a stormy sea, and he raised his wand in her direction, seeming to loom over her. She cowered, instinct making her shrink away even as her mind blanked of conscious thought.

Then the rage went out as quickly as it had come, and the Headmaster shrank from her in turn, sagging against the dirty wall behind him. “I am glad that you were here,” he said. He did not look at the ring again, but Hermione could see the tension in his shoulders, and the way his gaze turned anywhere but the ring. She couldn’t understand why it had gripped him so much harder, when he was by far the more powerful one between the two of them, in both mind and magic. However, they did not have time to stand around and question what had happened.

“Let’s get out of here,” she said in a trembling voice. “We’ve seen the Horcrux, now let’s go.”

The Headmaster hesitated, and Hermione wondered if she was going to have to drag Albus Dumbledore away by his robes. But then he shook his head as though shaking off water, and stood straighter. “You are absolutely right,” he said, still unwilling to look back at the ring sitting innocuously in its drawer. “We must destroy it.” Regret lay thickly over every word, and Hermione shivered.

“Yes, we _do_ have to destroy it,” she said, taking his unblemished left hand in her own. “Come on, professor. We have a job to do.”

As they exited the house, it seemed suddenly quite small and sad to Hermione. She couldn’t imagine anyone living here, not happily. There were signs of neglect everywhere, and she knew from Harry’s stories that not all the signs came from abandonment. No real happiness had lived in this house for a long time, long before Voldemort was ever born. Voldemort’s Horcrux wasn’t the only broken soul that had lived beneath the oppressive weight of these walls.

The sun was blinding when they exited. Hermione shook herself, spine straightening as a weight lifted from her shoulders. It felt like she had spent years in that place with the Headmaster, rather than minutes at most. A cool breeze ruffled her hair, and she quickened her pace towards the corner by the tree line where Dorcas and Professor McGonagall stood waiting for them.

“Is it there?” Dorcas asked, sparing only a brief glance at Hermione’s hand on the Headmaster’s arm.

“It is,” Professor Dumbledore said. Hermione was relieved to hear his voice come out normal, not the strangled thing it had become in that small, empty bedroom.

“Right then,” Dorcas said, straightening. Her blond hair was washed almost white by the sunlight. Her hand tightened on her wand. “What are we waiting for? Minerva and I have a finished the wards; let’s destroy the filthy thing.”

Professor Dumbledore hesitated again when they arrayed themselves in front of the house, his wand raised to cast the most deadly fire curse known to wizards. Hermione laid her hand on his arm again, looking up at him. “It has to be destroyed, professor,” she said quietly. “It doesn’t matter what other magic it might have, Voldemort made sure of that when he put a piece of his soul in it. It was tainted the moment he used it for such foul purposes. There is nothing else to do.”

She ignored Dorcas Meadows’ eyes on her back. The older woman could keep her curiosity to herself.

The Headmaster actually seemed to take heart from her words. She snatched her hand back as fiery creatures burst forth from his wand, snarling and writhing against the wards before descending on the wooden house in a fury. Once again, the Horcrux screamed as it was devoured by flames. This time, however, the wards and the knowledge of her own strength kept Hermione from crumbling under the sound of a fragment of tormented soul raging against death.

With two destroyed, only three were left in this timeline.

_You’re never going to have to do this, now, Harry,_ she thought, eyes raising to follow the trail of smoke drifting into the sunny sky before dispersing in the breeze and vanishing. _You’re going to have that normal life you always wanted. I promise._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments are always very appreciated!


	6. Chapter 5

Hermione barely felt recovered from the destruction of the ring when she was called on again by the Headmaster the very next day. 

It was time, she learned, to make her backstory official. Mr. Dagworth-Granger had agreed to the Headmaster’s plan. Hermione was going to be adopted, to officially have a new father, with Professor McGonagall as magical witness. 

Professor McGonagall picked her up from the tower this time and explained the situation as they walked to the Great Hall, where the Headmaster waited with one of his many Portkeys. Because of Mr. Dagworth-Granger’s disability, they were going to his home for the adoption process.

When the world finished spinning around Hermione and her vision settled, she found herself in a comfortable sitting room full of piles of books and parchment. Hermione had been in very few wizarding homes during her original time. This place was, at a glance, as different from the Burrow as Grimmauld Place had been, but in entirely the opposite direction. The books that filled the room, combined with the cluttered desk and comfortable chairs arranged haphazardly about, gave the place a cozy feeling in spite of the fact that the single room was as large as half of the Burrow put together. There was no dust anywhere and the soft yellow lamps scattered about between more books atop dark wooden end tables gave the room a gentle glow, but she spotted a few small cobwebs valiantly clinging to corners here and there.

A middle-aged man in a wheelchair greeted the small group from beside a large, cluttered desk. His dark skin was lined with wrinkles that showed his age, and his curly salt-and-pepper hair was cropped close to his head.  “Yes, my legs don't work,” he said, noticing the way her gaze stuck on his chair when she dragged her eyes away from all books.  Her eyes snapped back to his face and she blushed in embarrassment, but he waved a hand dismissively.  “It’s a gift from the dragonpox I had when I was ten, the year before I would have gone to Hogwarts.  I was homeschooled because of it, which will, as I suspect Albus is thinking, lend credence to the idea that I homeschooled you.”

She startled in realization, though it was obvious in retrospect. This must be the man Professor Dumbledore intended to use as her cover story, Humphrey Dagworth-Granger. The man she already been using as her cover story without his permission, she thought a tad uncomfortably. "It's, um, nice to meet you," she said, approaching cautiously and taking in the man more carefully as she extended a hand in greeting. "I'm so sorry about your wife."

Mr. Dagworth-Granger's mouth thinned in still-new grief and anger, but he shook her hand. His skin was soft and warm under hers, with calluses on the fingers and palm, in a pattern she recognized from long hours of holding a quill for endless writing. "Albus here tells me that you can help us kill the bastard responsible for her murder," he said, pain clear in his eyes and voice. "If that's the case, then I am glad to provide what help I can."

"Thank you," Hermione said sincerely. "I really do appreciate it. I can't imagine it's easy to pretend to have always had a new family member so soon on the heels of losing the one you really loved." Her voice choked up as she thought of her own parents, who would never see her again now. She hoped that Harry and Ron had found them in Australia after, if they beat Voldemort. _When_ they beat Voldemort.

He looked her up and down, a sad smile gracing his face. "Regina always wanted a daughter," he said. "And she wanted to join the Order, too. It was for my sake she stayed out of it. Because I couldn’t leave the house, and I asked her not to join anything more dangerous than she already had. I believed like a fool that we would be safe if we didn’t actively oppose You-Know-Who. I think she would approve of my helping you, were the she around to be asked.”  
Hermione didn't know what to say to that, so she said nothing but another strangled, “Thank you.” The silence after dragged uncomfortably, until Professor Dumbledore clapped his hands together, successfully shattering the tension. 

"Well, I am glad she meets with your approval, Humphrey," he said, his voice full of unexpected cheer. "This _shall_ make things easier, once you adopt her and the blood magic is settled."

"Blood magic?" Hermione asked, her head whipping around to stare at the Headmaster.

"Of course," he said, one bushy white eyebrow raised in her direction. "The adoption must be a magical one so that your blood reads as his. That way, no one will be able to effectively question your heritage, which will go a long way towards keeping you safe from Voldemort's suspicion until we have defeated him.”"Oh," Hermione said, a bit faint at the thought. Of course, she had never put in stock in blood purity and the importance of heritage. The notion had only ever caused her trouble, and be used to hurt and kill those like her and those she cared about. That didn't mean she was thrilled at the idea of her blood changing, however. Her parents may not have even had her yet in this timeline, but they were still _her parents._

"Will it actually change my blood?" she asked, a bit hesitant to hear the answer.

"In a sense," the Headmaster replied. "But if you are worried about it changing you, do not be. The magical adoption will change certain magical marker to show that you are Humphrey' daughter, but it will not alter who you are at any fundamental level."

Relief washed through Hermione.

"Luckily you already look enough like a member of my family," Mr. Dagworth-Granger chimed in, glancing at her dark skin and mess of unruly curls. "Not that it would be so bad if you hadn't. My wife was pure Irish, you know. So pale you'd guess she was the housebound one, never encountering a lick of sun in her life. But I must admit, it would have been harder on me if you’d looked more like her.“

"Alright," Hermione said, still shaky. "What do we have to do?"

"I will perform the ritual," the Headmaster said, "with Minerva as magical witness. All the two of you need do is provide a drop of blood each for the binding."

HPHPHP

To Hermione's surprise, the ritual was completed exactly as easily as the Headmaster said. She felt somewhat exhausted after, collapsing into a comfortable chair next to her adoptive father with a new bandage on her left pointer finger, but otherwise she felt no different than before. A stack of books with fascinating titles covering a range of theoretical charms fields teetered over her left side, and she almost wished this man had been a part of her life from the beginning of it. She could only imagine what it would have been like to really grow up with such a library at her fingertips.

"What now?" she asked, turning her attention reluctantly back to the Headmaster and her head of house. "Is that all?"

Mr. Dagworth-Granger was watching her from beneath gray, bushy eyebrows. Before either of her professors had a chance to respond, he asked his own gruff question.

"I hear you're entering your last year of Hogwarts," he said. “Now that you’re officially my daughter, I really _must_ ask: what sort of OWLs did you get?” She stared at the man, and his lips quirked in a playful grin.

“I’m curious to know what sort of job I did homeschooling my only child."

Hermione recounted her scores from the exams with a blush, hoping it didn't sound like bragging. "I got mostly O's," she said, glancing at the ground, "except for Defense. I only got an E in Defense. But I'm taking NEWTs in Charms, Defense Against the Dark Arts, Herbology, Transfiguration, Arithmancy, Ancient Runes, and Potions."

Mr. Dagworth-Granger smiled at her. The expression brightened his face and made the the old scars from the dragonpox recede into laughter lines.  “I suppose that’ll do, for a child of mine.”

"Right," Professor McGonagall said, breaking up the discussion with a severe expression. "Perhaps you can discuss these details later. Right now, Albus has fabricated records for you, to account for your first through sixth years of schooling." Her face twisted in distaste at the idea, and Hermione couldn't blame her. Fabricating school records was such a terrible thing to do, even if it was necessary in her case to keep up her story. She couldn’t help but feel a bit slimy at the thought. Once she defeated Voldemort, she hoped she could make a life for herself here based on real accomplishments of her own.

_If_ she had to stay here, that was. A small piece of her still longed for a way to go _home._

"I shall be accompanying you out again, to the Ministry this time to file your 'school records,'" her professor said, distaste still clinging to every word, even as the necessity of the action stopped either of them from protesting. "And then Humphrey has requested that we stop by Gringotts to give you provisional access to his family vaults."

"Oh," Hermione exclaimed, looking at Mr. Dagworth-Granger. "You don't have to do that!"

He scoffed. "If you're going to be my child, then you'll have access to my vaults." He rolled his eyes at the look on her face. "I'm not giving you full access to everything a real heir would have,” he clarified, "but you shall not need the generosity of the school's orphan fund. You'll have enough to complete your studies without any struggles, and if you bring down You-Know-Who, it will be more than enough repayment for whatever gold you spend."

“Won’t that look suspicious to the Goblins?” she asked in one last attempt to reject the overwhelming kindness. “It would be weird, wouldn’t it, if your “child” is only now receiving access to your vaults….”

Mr. Dagworth-Granger laughed. “Of course it will,” he said, “but Goblins as a rule don’t share the business of their customers with the Ministry or anyone else. They’re very proud of the privacy they offer, are Goblins. The wouldn’t even rat out a muggleborn who had just opened an account with their last few pennies, let alone a member of a family who has been banking there for generations with multiple vaults.”

Hermione had not known that. She was irritated at herself for it. For all her dedication to the idea of helping non-human magical creatures, it seemed she did tend to overlook actually studying their culture. “Oh,” she said, and then, “Thank you," again. She put aside her irritation at herself for the moment, promising to revisit the topic whenever she got a chance to look into house-elf rights again. For now, Mr. Dagworth-Granger’s generosity humbled her, and reaffirmed her determination to bring down Voldemort for more than just her unborn friends. "I won't let you down."

HPHPHP

The trip to the Ministry was shockingly uncomplicated. There were a number of forms to fill out of course, plenty of bureaucratic red tape to pass through, but most of the forms were completed by Professor McGonagall, or already completed and owled in by Mr. Dagworth-Granger in advance. Her fake school records were submitted by shortly after noon, and then she was an official member of society in 1977, no longer a ghost who did not belong.

It was absurd, how quickly her new life was built and made legal, once they began.

"We've only got Gringotts left," Professor McGonagall said after side-along apparating Hermione back to Diagon Alley. But perhaps you would like to eat something first?

Hermione’s stomach growled at the thought of food. Professor McGonagall smiled at the sound while Hermione blushed. “I believe that is answer enough.”

They chose a small booth at the back of the pub and ordered sandwiches. The whole thing reminded Hermione forcibly of acquiring her school things only a week ago. It felt simultaneously like barely a day ago and already a lifetime past. “Thank you for accompanying me on all these trips,” she said, picking at her sandwich. “I’m sure you must be very busy.”

Her professor snorted inelegantly. “My dear girl,” she said, “I work for a school. Taking care of my students is my _first_ responsibility.”

“But what about all your research?” Hermione asked, thinking of the book her professor had bought the previous week. Another thought struck her. “And what about lesson planning? You teach quite a lot of classes!”

“Yes,” her professor said calmly, “classes that I have been teaching for several decades now. While there is always room for improvement and a teacher’s job is never done, I dare say I have the bones of all my lessons quite thoroughly settled. Besides, I always expect a bit of my summer to go towards shepherding new muggleborn students into the magical world and helping them purchase their things.” Her voice gentled to a level Hermione rarely heard as she voiced the counterargument to the complaint Hermione didn’t have a change to make. “You may not technically be new to our world or to Hogwarts, but you are new _here_. I would be happy to help you adjust regardless of your, ah, delicate knowledge. You are my student now, and a member of my house to boot, and I would be quite remiss in my duties if I did not offer my assistance as you need it.”

Hermione stared at her plate, tears threatening to fall on her half-eaten sandwich. “I just feel like I’m going to be such a burden to so many people,” she said quietly. “Everyone is being so kind to me, and none of you know me at all.”

Her professor’s hand was warm when it covered hers across the table. “In a world too often plagued by cruelty and selfishness,” she said sternly, “one should be grateful for the kindness one finds.”

“Yes, of course,” Hermione said, sniffling back her tears. “I _am_.”

The rest of their conversation was interrupted by a commotion at the door from the alley. Hermione’s breath caught in her throat when she glanced towards the noise, and she had to stop herself from rushing over. She recognized the boys just entering the pub, even if her recognition was colored by memories of someone else.

James Potter looked _so much_ like Harry it made her heart squeeze in her chest and her breath grow faint. He was grinning and laughing with another boy, his face open and _happy_ in a way she had almost never seen on her best friend. His voice was as loud as Harry’s only got when he was angry and shouting, but James was only laughing, the sound carrying easily through the pub and drawing attention he seemed not to care about. Harry had always been so soft-spoken in crowded places, always hunching away from the attention he drew just because of his name.

The boy next to him could be none other than Sirius Black, equally loud and bright and happy as his companion. It wasn’t until she saw him, young and whole, that Hermione truly appreciated the difference between this Sirius and the shell of a man she had known in her own time. Her heart ached for both of them. She tracked their progress through the pub, even as the majority of the patrons returned to their meals, letting the new voices fade into the background.

She was glad she had been watching when their progress was halted at the far door back into muggle London. The door opened before the two boys reached it, and a small, dark-haired woman entered, trailed by a thin boy with greasy hair and a permanent scowl etched on his sharp features. She gasped in recognition, not needing the shout of, “Snivelly! Fancy meeting you here!” that echoed through the pub from Sirius Black to know who it was that had just entered.

The woman with her old potions professor stood straighter and glared at Sirius, who ignored her as though she didn’t exist. Hermione nearly growled in indignation. Harry had been right, she decided as Sirius made a few more snide comments towards the disconcertingly young Professor ( _not yet professor_ ) Snape; this Sirius really was a right jerk. While Harry’s father didn’t join in on the taunting, he didn’t say anything either. Merely stood at Sirius’s side smirking.

A sound from the other side of her booth drew her attention briefly away from the three boys. Professor McGonagall was eying the disaster in the making with a hawk-like look in her eyes. Before Hermione could ask, the professor was standing with a sweep of red and green robes to stride across the room.

“Mr. Black,” she said, voice commanding the attention of all three boys and the woman who could only be Snape’s mother. “I see you and Mr. Potter have completed your shopping for the day.” James adjusted the bag over his shoulder and ran a nervous hand through his hair, subtly shifting closer to Sirius. “I suggest you both run along, now, and allow Mr. Snape to continue with his day.”

“Yeah, professor, sorry, we were just going,” James tried to say, tugging on Sirius’s arm. “C’mon, mate.”

“We just wanted to say hi to Snapey here before we left,” Sirius said, all false brightness as he grinned at Professor McGonagall’s surely unexpected arrival. Hermione was impressed with his bold behavior. She would never have been able to speak back to a teacher like that.

Luckily, it seemed James’s hand on his arm was enough to keep him in check. The two boys who would one day be her best friend’s father and godfather exited a few moments later under the disapproving glare of their head of house. Snape, for his part, had not once changed his own expression or moved away from his mother. “Thank you,” Minerva, his mother said for both of them. Her voice was quiet enough that Hermione would not have heard if she hadn’t been straining herself to listen. Even so, the rest of the words the two women exchanged were too quiet for Hermione to make out.

Finally, Professor McGonagall turned and began making her way back to the table. Snape glared at her back even as he trailed after his mother towards the alley.

“I apologize for the disturbance,” the professor said. She slid gracefully back into the booth across from Hermione, who turned to her with a guilty start.

“It’s okay,” Hermione replied. “I know Hogwarts has its share of bullies and cliques just like any other school.” Once, she had imagined differently, in the few glorious months between learning that magic existed and actually arriving at Hogwarts for her first year. She had naively imagined a utopia, a school where finally everyone would be like her, and they would all get along, and she would never have to deal with another bully again. Instead, some aspects of Hogwarts had been all too familiar from her primary school days.

“I believe it is time to visit Gringotts, if you are done,” Professor McGonagall said, the abrupt subject change drawing Hermione back to the present. “The Goblins will almost certainly do a blood test, and the adoption will ensure that you're deemed worthy of access to Humphrey's vaults. However, the test will also reveal your true blood line. Therefore, it is advisable to be polite to the Goblins, regardless of what your new father said. They have no love for wizarding laws and regulations and turning you in will not be at the top of their minds, but if you're an idiot they can easily become a weak link in your story."

Hermione frowned. "Of course I will be polite," she said with an offended huff. "Even if they couldn't do anything to hurt me, I don't make a habit of being rude to anyone for no reason." The unprovoked rudeness she had just witnessed flashed through her mind, and she frowned harder.

Professor McGonagall, however, smiled at her. "Good."

The Goblins were as gruff and brusque as Hermione remembered from her own time. Recalling her professor's words, she made an extra effort to be as polite as possible, to show Professor McGonagall that she wasn't about to ruin her falsified story with unnecessary rudeness to magical creatures. Just because _some_ witches and wizards viewed Goblins as beneath them didn't mean Hermione thought that way.

The blood test was the most quick and painless part of the whole affair, and she walked about of Gringotts not half an hour after entering with a small bag of coins and several feet of parchment detailing her bloodlines that she was curious to read through.

Halfway down the steps outside the bank, Hermione halted with a gasp.

"Is everything alright?" her professor asked, stopping to turn back to Hermione.

"Is this what I think it is?" Hermione asked, holding out the third page of parchment and pointing to a few lines halfway down the page.

Professor McGonagall frowned at the lines that detailed a particular branch only a few generations from where the Goblin's test ended. She hummed. "Yes," she said, finally, pulling Hermione's arm until she kept walking. "That is an interesting bit of news."

They returned directly to the Dagworth-Granger home via floo from the Leakey Cauldron, and Hermione could not decide whether she was grateful or unhappy to see Mr. Dagworth-Granger again, engaged in deep discussion with the Headmaster until she and Professor McGonagall stepped one after the other from the fireplace.

"Mr. Dagworth-Granger," she said, settling somewhere in between the two emotions, "Do you know where the Granger half of your name comes from?" He squinted at her in confusion, and rolled across the room to take the parchment she handed him.

A few moments later, he snorted in amusement. She raised her eyebrows, and he grinned at her, delight sparkling in his eyes. “It would seem we _are_ in fact very distant relatives," he mused, "but in an interesting direction.  According to the magical tracers, you are truly muggleborn, not descended from Squibs at any point.”  Mr. Dagworth-Granger continued to grin at her.  “I do recall some tales of how our hyphenated name signified the coming together of two quite different houses, and I know for a fact that the Dagworth line is a very old pureblood line, aside from the occasional half-bloods by marriage we produce.  It would seem the last Granger without a hyphen in my line was a muggleborn such as yourself. A muggleborn _relation_ of yours.”

Hermione was relieved to hear the confirmation of her uncertain readings of the bloodline.  It would have felt very unsatisfying, she thought, to have learned that she was _not_ the muggleborn she thought she was.  All her school years she had been taunted and then hunted for her blood, and had taken it upon herself to prove through her academic brilliance that muggleborns _were_ just as worthy of magical education, no matter what anyone else thought.  To have learned that she was related to pureblooded wizards in a direct line would have brought all of that into question.  Instead, she was the muggleborn she had always thought herself to be, and still just as worthy of the world that had taken her in at eleven and shown her that magic was real.

“Course,” Mr. Dagworth-Granger was saying as she ruminated on her heritage, “my family would never outright admit the ‘unusual union’ of our houses may have been the union of a muggleborn and a pureblood.  Everyone talks of the importance of family and heritage, but no one wants to dig back far enough to find the muggles that might be hiding in their bloodline.”  He scoffed.  “It’s quite ridiculous.  I for one am perfectly proud of my blood, whatever it may consist of.”

"As am I," Hermione replied, smiling back at him. "I do appreciate your help in building me a story for this time that will help me bring down Voldemort, but I will always be proud to be muggleborn."

“And I am also proud to learn that you are a member of my family in truth,” he continued, taking her hand, “and not just through this farce of an adoption. I may have known you for less than a day, but already I can tell that you are an exceptionally bright and clever witch, and one who cares for things worth caring about instead of silly blood feuds and false promises of meaningless power.”

Hermione blinked back tears at his kind words. “Thank you,” she said, feeling a bit of a broken record rather than the clever witch he claimed. “I have always tried to do my family proud, because I know their pride is something worth striving for. I hope to be worthy of your pride someday, too.”

“I daresay you already are worthy,” he said, squeezing her palm with surprisingly strength. “But I do not wish to discourage you from continuing to work hard and accomplish great things.” He glanced behind himself at the Headmaster, lips quirking in a sardonic smile. “Therefore, I believe it is time I let you go for now, back to that castle of yours and the fight that I cannot bring myself to participate in more actively. Do feel free, however, to send an owl, if you need any academic advice. Or if you need any advice at all. It turns out we truly are family, and I would like to be there for you, if you need someone.”

The lump in Hermione’s throat remained even after she returned to Hogwarts with her professors.

Two Horcruxes had been destroyed already, and she had met such unbelievably kind and helpful people here in the past, not least of which was Mr. Dagworth-Granger. Before bed, she added him to her mental list of people who deserved a better future than the one she had grown up in. Every one of them deserved all the effort she was going to have to put in, now that the easiest Horcruxes had been disposed of. 

She sat at her desk in her pajamas that night and composed the beginnings of a letter to her adoptive father, restarting three times as tears smudged the page. He deserved a proper thank you, too, and she found as she wrote that she genuinely wanted to keep in touch with him. It felt nice to have someone besides a professor or a distant Auror in on her secret and willing to help, and nicer still to know he wanted her to write. She could only put so much in a letter, but she had a decent half-finished draft by the time exhaustion weighed down her eyelids and forced her to bed.

HPHPHP

Compared to the next three weeks, that first week was a whirlwind of activity.

The final three Horcruxes, however, needed much more careful planning to acquire and destroy, especially the two held by Lucius Malfoy and Bellatrix Lestrange. She had no idea how they were meant to obtain those objects without alerting Voldemort immediately to their plans. By the time the start of term rolled around, neither she nor her professors had come any closer to a plan. Dorcas Meadows was halfway in favor of just storming both homes, or getting the Aurors to conduct raids, but even she had to concede the impracticality of either option.

The start of term approached, in the end, more quickly than Hermione expected. Before she quite realized how swift the days had flown by, September 1st had arrived.

She arrived in the Great Hall before the train had made it to Hogsmeade, taking up a place at the empty Gryffindor table while the other professors slowly filtered in to the head table. All of them had been informed of her early arrival after her adoption had been made official. Given her cover story, a few professors had stopped her in the hallways shortly before the beginning of term to offer condolences and offers of support if she needed it. She had managed to dodge Professor Slughorn the one time she had spotted him, and wished she could have dodged the rest as well. Their concern and interest would only get more unbearable as soon as classes began.

For the first time in her life, Hermione realized she wasn’t completely looking forward to the beginning of the academic year. She stared determinedly at the table and the empty dishes before her as a roar of sound grew in the hall outside. The doors to the Great Hall opened to the bang of Hermione’s rabbiting heart, and she couldn’t help her eyes from scanning the crush students in spite of herself.

Soon, Harry’s parents were going to sit at her table, and people she had known as war-torn and weary adults or names on gravestones and the subject of terse but dusty obituaries were going to smile at her and talk to her and expect her to smile back. She took a deep, shaky breath, her hands forming fists in her lap. She had thought hunting Horcruxes and fighting Death Eaters was the hardest thing she would ever have to do.

She had to admit, as a skinny Indian boy with messy hair and glasses and a hauntingly familiar face sat down in front of her with a flourish, that she had been wrong.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And there it is, the start of term! Now things can get a little more complicated for poor Hermione. (Or... a lot more complicated)


	7. Chapter 6

The smile on James’s face faltered as Hermione stared at him. He visibly forced it back to full brightness when a chubby blond boy sat next to him, and two more students flanked Hermione on either side.

“You must be the new student!” he said, holding out a hand across the table. “I’m James Potter, Head Boy!” He beamed. When Hermione made no move to take his head, the smile dimmed again. Eventually he withdrew his hand, running it nervously through his hair. “Right, well, I guess maybe you’re still a bit in shock being new here. It can be a bit overwhelming, I’ve heard. Wasn’t for me, but not everyone can be as awesome as I am!” He spoke with his hands a great deal, Hermione noticed. It was something different from Harry, something she held on to on top of his carefree demeanor and hazel eyes, to remind her that this was not her best friend sitting across from her.

“So,” he said, continuing on in spite of her silence, “the Head Girl, Lily Evans, and I have already been briefed on your circumstances.”

“Was your mother really killed by Voldemort?” the boy next to James Potter asked. James immediately cuffed him over the head.

“Pete! You can’t just ask that!” he said archly, but the ghost of laughter hid beneath the stern reprimand. A tall, willowy girl with deep auburn hair (red, but darker and less overwhelmingly vibrant than Ron’s or Ginny’s, Hermione noticed with a feeling like iron bands around her chest) walked behind the two boys and cuffed them both for good measure.

“My apologies if these boys are bothering you,” said the girl who could only be Lily Evans. James was already staring at the newcomer as though Hermione had ceased to exist. “I cannot believe Professor Dumbledore made this idiot Head Boy.” She sniffed, before turning a gentler smile on Hermione. “I’m Lily Evans, Head Girl and one of your new dorm mates. If you need any help learning your way around the castle or dealing with the school work, I’m happy to be of assistance. Professor McGonagall, our head of house here in Gryffindor, has already informed us of your circumstances.”

"You're both unbearable."

The smug voice to her left had Hermione’s head turning reluctantly to the dark-haired boy beside her. Sirius Black looked exactly the same as he had when she had seen him from a distance several weeks earlier in the Leakey Cauldron. That is to say, he looked entirely different from the broken man aged beyond his years that she had known as Harry’s godfather. He smirked at her when he saw he had her attention.

“If you want to get away from these rule-abiding head students,” he drawled in what she assumed was meant to be a sensual voice, “I’d be happy to give you a _private_ tour of the castle.” He licked his lips, making it quite obvious just exactly what he meant.

“No thank you,” Hermione said, eyebrows raised in disbelief at the young man sitting next to her. “I’m really not interested, sorry.”

Across from them, James crowed with laughter. Apparently, his friend getting rejected was enough to tear his attention away from his future wife. He reached across the table to and slapped a comforting hand on Sirius’s shoulder, still laughing. “Tough luck, pal,” he said, and smirked. “Looks like this bird has got your number.”

Hermione decided not to mention just how very true that statement was.

She rather vividly remembered a certain conversation they’d had during the summer before her fifth year, about unrequited crushes on friends. It had been obvious to her, at least, even if apparently not to anyone else, that Sirius had been pining over Professor Lupin. Just as obvious had been the way Professor Lupin avoided his gaze whenever it got too longing, and the guilty looks he wore when he thought no one was watching. So, she had gone to Sirius one evening with the thought that maybe he would have advice for her, in dealing with her own more-than-friendly feelings for a certain oblivious redhead she knew. 

After he got over his shock at her observations, he’d admitted that she was right. He was gay, and he did have a crush on her old defense professor. The only advice he had offered was that, for the sake of keeping a true friendship intact, such unrequited feelings were worth the pain they brought with their silence. He had also confessed that Professor Lupin had been one of the only people remaining who knew about the direction of his interests, aside from Harry's father and Pettigrew. He had been too afraid to be open about it as a child and young adult, and then he had been in Azkaban, and then on the run, and dating opportunities had not exactly been thick on the ground for such a life.

The much younger man — boy, really — next to her clearly didn’t realize what she knew. He made a filthy comment to James about girls in general that had the others girls that had settled next to Lily throwing him disgusted looks, but Hermione could see the discomfort in James’s eyes beneath the laughter, and she knew that Remus on her other side wasn’t just shaking his head over the comment itself. The older Sirius had also confessed to her that the Marauders had been the only ones at Hogwarts who had known where his interests really lay.

As Sirius schooled his face into a pouting look of disappointment at her rejection, she spared a moment of pity that such a brave man in so many parts of his life could still be so afraid of the piece of himself that preferred men to women, that he would cultivate a reputation as a playboy and hide his true self away. She offered him a smile she hoped was comforting, and a small lie that she hoped would ease his mind. “I’m not really interested in anything but friendship this year,” she said softly, turning her gaze down to the empty plate in front of her. “But thank you, all of you, for offering your help.”

She glanced at the people sitting around her, including the tired, brown-haired boy on her other side who she suspected was the younger Remus Lupin, and it was no struggle at all to let her voice with the pain of recent loss.

“Of course,” Lily Evans said. She did her level best to glare at Sirius and smile comfortingly at Hermione at the same time. It was quite an impressive achievement. From the expression on his face, James Potter found his crush quite impressive as well.

"Anyway, I'm sure you'd like to know who you'll be rooming with this year." She indicated the girls sitting near her, clustering away from the boys. "This is Marlene McKinnon, Emilia Florence, Dominique Gadhavi, and Coraline Walsh,” she said, starting with the girl immediately to her right and going around the whole group. Each girl waved at Hermione as she was introduced, but the only one that captured Hermione's attention was the first.

Marlene McKinnon was a stout and solemn-faced witch with straight black hair, a few strands of which framed equally dark eyes where they escaped her ponytail. She was quite beautiful, if reserved in her smile, but Hermione couldn't help the image of a black and white obituary for a whole family wiped out personally by Voldemort from superimposing over the girl in her vision. The McKinnon family had been a part of the Order, and they had paid as dearly as anyone for it.

Any more opportunity for conversation or morbid thoughts was cut short by the arrival of the first years, thankfully. The whole school clapped for the Sorting Hat’s song and laughed at the awe of the new students. Hermione clapped along even though she barely heard it, and made a point to clap for each new first year added to her house as well. 

There were so many of them. Their faces shone with innocence beneath the candlelight and the enchanted ceiling. They had no idea they future they would grow up in, if Hermione didn’t stop it.

There was no time for conversations to resume right after the sorting, either, as the Headmaster began his usual speech immediately after Zabini, Armand, took his seat at the Slytherin table to the tune of loud booing from Sirius and James. The Headmaster stood up at the Head Table and began the usual start of term notices, to which Hermione paid even less attention than she had given to the sorting.

“I’m sorry about Sirius,” Remus said in a quiet voice from next to her while Professor Dumbledore droned on. She startled, nearly leaping out of her seat at the unexpected words.

“Oh, it’s okay,” she said. She turned to smile at Remus and admonished herself silently not to be so jumpy. “Really, I’ve heard worse.”

“Still, he can be a bit of a prat,” Remus muttered. “But he’s a wonderful friend when you get to know him.” He smiled, a soft grin that spoke of the closeness that existed between the two boys. Hermione’s heart ached at the sight. “I’m Remus, by the way,” he said a moment later. “Remus Lupin.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Remus,” she said. The urge to call him ‘Professor Lupin’ lay heavy on her tongue, but she resisted. Out of all the students around her, Remus Lupin so far bore the most resemblance to his older self. Already, exhaustion lay heavy on his shoulders, and a thin white scar cut across one yellow-brown eye too old for even his prematurely lined face.

Luckily, her gaze was drawn away from Remus Lupin, Lily Evans, and all the too-young, too-living students around her a moment later.

The sound of her name in the Headmaster’s voice called her attention finally Professor Dumbledore at the front of the room. “Lastly, (and I’m sure you are grateful to hear _that_ word),” he was saying, “this year our seventh-year Gryffindors are joined by Miss Hermione Dagworth-Granger, who is attending Hogwarts for her final year of school after six years of homeschooling. I trust you will all make her feel at home, and request from all of the bright shining faces before me that you not bother our new arrival overmuch about the circumstances that brought her to our lovely castle. Family tragedy is a personal matter, not one to be used as a bludgeon for badgering your fellows.”

Of course, even before he finished speaking, heads began turning throughout the hall to catch a glimpse of Hermione. She shrank down in her seat and clenched her hands nervously together.

“Well that was bound to make you the center of gossip for weeks, at least,” Lily said in disapproval. She stared at the Headmaster with a frown.

“I suppose there wasn’t much way to avoid that, was there,” Hermione said, a bit morose, “not unless he wanted to avoid mentioning my arrival at all. And I suppose Hogwarts does not get very many students like me.”

“No, that’s true.” Lily turned a more sympathetic gaze back on Hermione, who tried not to look like she wanted nothing more than to sink through the floor. Even if she had never been _Harry Potter_ , being his friend had been enough to garner her a great deal more attention than she had ever wanted during her school years. It never managed to sit well with her. With her nerves already frayed from all the dead people sat around her, the attention of the rest of the hall felt even heavier than usual.

At that moment, luckily, Professor Dumbledore finally finished his speech. Subsequently, the students of Hogwarts were utterly distracted from the new student by the arrival of food that filled up the gleaming bowls of steaming stews and platters of meats and savory breads all up and down the house tables. Pitchers of juice and water and tea showed up between giant bowls of potatoes and intricate silver gravy boats, nearly blocking her view of her new housemates on the other side of the table.

“Food,” she said gratefully, and immediately proceeded to grab as much as she could from nearby dishes with little regard for what she ended up on her plate. As soon as her plate was full, she took up the task of stuffing her face ungracefully enough to make Ron proud. The appalling table manners brought her a number of raised eyebrows and an amused snort from Sirius, but it also gave her the excuse not to keep talking to these young familiar strangers for a while. That made it worthwhile, even when she spat breadcrumbs accidentally down her front and had to mumble a red-faced cleaning charm in between bites of food.

By the time the feast was over, Hermione had managed to mostly avoid getting drawn into any more conversations. Lily had glared at James the one time he started asking more questions, having apparently sensed Hermione’s desire not to talk further. The redhead’s glare had been more than sufficient to turn James’s tentative question for Hermione into a conversation with Sirius halfway through dinner, and Hermione took a moment to silently convey her thanks with a look.

Finally, the last deserts and crumbs vanished from the table, leaving them once more gleaming and pristine, and the longest dinner of Hermione’s life drew to an end. James clapped his hands together, glancing down the table to the new first years. They had clustered together by a knot of younger students that looked to be around second or third year. “If the first years will follow me,” he said in a booming voice that carried easily through the chatter filling the hall, “it is time for you to learn the way to Gryffindor tower and your dorms, so that you can stay up all night talking amongst each other and tell us tomorrow that you slept all night like good little firsties.”

“James,” Lily hissed in exasperation. She rolled her eyes and stalked ahead of him, sweeping towards the new students with a forced grin on her face. James, as Hermione had already come to expect, chased after her immediately with a mouthful of charming protests. In the commotion of people watching (and Sirius doing his level best to add to) the drama with the new students, Hermione slipped away from her new house mates and out of the Great Hall. 

A sigh of relief escaped her when the Hufflepuffs and Slytherins peeled away towards their respective sections of the dungeons and the Ravenclaws broke off moments later to head towards their own tower. Finally, she was alone, free of chattering ghosts and reminders of her predicament. The castle was silent once more while she walked down a rather randomly winding path that would hopefully get her to the tower without running into anyone else. The thick band of anxiety around her chest loosened for the first time since she had woken up that morning, and she breathed in deep, allowing her steps to slow and her mind to wander.

In the silent, darkening corridors, as familiar shadows lengthened along the walls and floors from the setting sun outside large, timeless windows, she could have been home. The tapestries and portraits she knew had hardly changed in two decades, and the stone beneath her feet had been worn smooth long before even Harry’s parents time by the passage of countless hurrying feet. The halls had always held a sense of long years passed within their sheltering walls. Age lay heavy in the air, twinkling between the dust motes dancing in the last rays of light stretching out from the sun as it sank beyond the horizon past the Black Lake.

Alone as a ghost herself, Hermione could have been in any time. Harry and Ron could be just around that corner, or perhaps just up that next staircase, laughing about their latest Divination homework, or heatedly discussing recent Quidditch news. She would even have been delighted to hear them complain about Malfoy and Snape, and beg her for help with Charms homework.

It was a dream, but one she wished desperately could be real.

She didn’t know _how_ she was going to survive a _whole year_ of living with and taking classes alongside the people she had met tonight. Already she had struggled at dinner, and that was just _one_ night. Harry’s dad looked so much like him that she had found herself more than once wanting to blurt out something foolish, thoughts and concerns that only Harry would understand.

Even without a stunning resemblance to one of her best friends, the others had provided their own difficulties. Lily carried so many of Harry’s mannerisms that Hermione had lost count. It was a shock, after spending an evening with the girl, that people who had known her hadn’t compared Harry to his mother more often. Sirius was a strange and baffling enigma, so different from the man she had known to be almost a different person in truth. Remus, on the other hand, was too similar to the quiet, tired man he would grow into. She hardly dared think about her impressions of the last Marauder. Peter had laughed at the jokes made by James and Sirius, but had hardly contributed anything more to the conversation. He had been nearly as quiet as Hermione, aside from his laughter.

She wondered when he would take the Dark Mark and set so many ugly things about her own time in motion. She had no particular love for the boy, and meeting him tonight had hardly changed her opinion of him as a person, but she suspected it would make the others’ lives a great deal happier if one they believed to be their friend never turned against them and betrayed them all. It didn’t help that half the jokes Sirius made were at Peter’s expense, and yet he laughed at them as though he couldn’t hear the bite of genuine cruelty in his friend’s voice.

Her feet finally carried her the last slow steps to the Fat Lady’s portrait, only for her to realize that she didn’t know the password. “Um,” she said, at a loss. “Is it the same password, or have Lily or James already changed it?” The Fat Lady didn’t answer her, of course. “In absentia,” she tried, but the password she had set over the summer didn’t work.

She was such an idiot. A loud sigh escaped her, and she wondered if she was going to spend her first night of term sleeping on the floor in the hallway. Or perhaps she could go to the Room of Requirement, instead. Surely it could conjure up a decent bedroom for her.

Her thoughts were interrupted when the portrait swung open, and an annoyed and slightly overwhelming Lily Evans spilled out into the corridor. Her eyes widened in relief as soon as they lit upon Hermione standing awkwardly in the corridor.

“Oh, Hermione, thank goodness!” she said, dragging Hermione back through the portrait and nearly running into the group of students following behind her. “I found her right outside!” she called to the group, all of whom wore prefect badges. James caught her as she stumbled in her attempt to avoid the other students, and a blush to rival any Weasley stained her cheeks. She turned quickly to Hermione, pulling herself away from James and planting her fists on thin hips. “We were worried about you!” she said in what only barely managed not to be a shout. “We thought you’d gotten lost in the castle! You shouldn’t have disappeared on us like that!” Her glare could have rivaled Harry’s at his worst.

Hermione instinctively shrank back with a placating smile. “I forgot that the password would change when you and James arrived,” Hermione said, still berating herself mentally for her oversight. “I’ve been here since July, so I already knew my way to the tower.”

Lily’s expression softened. “Oh,” she said. “Well, yes, the new password is Bertie Botts, because,” and her voice turned low and mocking, “in Gryffindor, we’re all uniquely flavored!” She rolled her eyes. “Unfortunately, James got to the portrait before I did, so you can thank him for both the password and the reason for it.” The boy in question grinned at her complaints and flicked her shoulder.

“You’re just jealous of my creativity,” he said.

Judging by Lily’s face, “jealous” was not the word Hermione would have used.

"It could be worse," Hermione said with an awkward smile, in an attempt to diffuse the tension radiating from the Head Girl. She shuddered at the memory of the horrid time during her third year when the Fat Lady's portrait had been replaced by Sir Cadogan. Next to her, Lily huffed in disbelief.

"Sure," Lily said, humoring her. "Anyway, you must be exhausted! Let me show you which dorm is ours."

"That would be lovely, thanks," Hermione replied. She waved goodbye to James and the other prefects, and followed Lily up the staircase to the girls' dorms. They stopped at a door near the end of the hallway with a golden number seven affixed at eye level.

“This is us,” Lily said. In Hermione’s time, this room had been home to Ginny’s year. She had spent plenty of time behind that door, talking about school and the future and boys with Ginny. The extra door that had provided Hermione a private room during the summer was gone, a smooth gray wall all that remained in its place. She swallowed and forced a smile onto her face as she followed Lily into her new home for the next year.

A cry of, “Oh, you found her!” greeted the two girls when they entered the dorm. The speaker was the chubby, diminutive brunette Hermione remembered being introduced to at dinner. Emilia Florence, if she remembered correctly (and she usually did). A halfblood who had scowled quite fiercely at any mention of dark lords and wars, and announced her intention to stay out of such things. Fighting only brought more trouble and strife, she had said more than once when Death Eaters came up, before changing the subject to lighter things. It had taken Hermione most of dinner to figure out the source of the nagging familiarity at her name.

Voldemort didn’t care who did or did not want to fight. He and his Death Eaters were happy to kill anyone who did not bow down to their cause. Even those who were just shopping in Diagon Alley with their muggle father when Death Eaters decided to make an example of _the impure_. Emilia Florence was one more ghost to add to the tally, and one more life that Hermione was determined to save.

“Found her right outside the portrait, in fact,” Lily announced, as she pointed Hermione towards her bed and successfully brought her back from her dark thoughts.

“I didn’t realize the password would change once term started,” Hermione admitted with an awkward, self deprecating smile. She sat gingerly on the edge of her bed and stared at her new housemates. She felt strange and small and under the eyes of these people she should never have met, flashbacks to her friendless first months in Hogwarts building in her mind. There was every chance she would be friendless here, without Harry and Ron and a troll to bind them together. She was under no illusions that she had become any _less_ of an overbearing swot since first year, in spite of all Ron’s best attempts to change her.

The bed dipped beside her, and she stared at Lily in surprise.

“I could feel you stressing and zoning out all the way on the other side of the room,” Lily said wryly, but the smile she directed at Hermione was kind. “I already reminded the other girls about Professor Dumbledore’s request, but I wanted to remind _you_ that no one in this room is ever going to judge you for being upset about your recent loss. It’s rather obvious you don’t want to talk about it, but you don’t have to avoid us all to avoid the subject. And if anyone _does_ give you trouble, you can tell me and I’ll set them straight.” Lily fidgeted and twisted her hands in fluffy pink pajamas, her youthful inexperience with serious conversations showing in her uncertain manerisms, but her eyes were intensely earnest. 

They were Harry’s eyes, with a look that could have sat easily on Harry’s face.

“Thanks,” Hermione said, once she had swallowed down the lump of glass in her throat. “I do appreciate that, Lily.”

Lily’s next move surprised her. Harry’s mother leaned over quite abruptly and dragged Hermione into a fierce hug, awkward due to the angle but full of warmth that Hermione had not felt all summer. “I am so sorry for your loss,” she said, quietly, in Hermione’s ear. And then she pulled back, and Hermione almost missed the comforting weight of another person pressed against her.

“Thank you,” she said again, though the glass in her throat had grown larger and more jagged at the other girl’s words. She didn’t often indulge in flights of fancy, but she gave herself a moment to imagine that Lily’s words meant more than sympathy for a fake mother lost before Hermione ever had a chance to know the woman. For just a moment, she let herself believe that Lily meant her real loss, the loss of her whole world and everyone she knew, and the loss of Lily’s own son, who had been one of the best friends that anyone could have ever asked for. “That means a lot,” she added, and smiled through wet eyes. “You’re a good person, Lily Evans. I think I shall be glad to get to know you.”

“Oh,” Lily said, and she blushed and stared at her lap. “That’s really nice of you to say. But it’s also quite late now, and I should probably stop bothering you and let you get to bed. I can only imagine the first day of classes at Hogwarts will be just as overwhelming for a new seventh year as it was for me in my first year.”

Hermione watched Lily disappear back to the other side of the room. Dominique and Marlene pounced on the redheaded girl the moment she sat down. Lily’s face twisted in admonishment at something said by one of the other two, but soon the three girls curled up together to chat in low voices, the closeness of their friendship clear in the way they leaned together and smiled at each other. Hermione turned away and changed swiftly into her pajamas. She blinked furiously to keep tears from her eyes even as her memories of her own lost friends threatened to overwhelm her. It would do her no good to start her first night with her new dorm mates sobbing like a madwoman.

She closed the hangings around her bed anyway after she had changed and brushed her teeth and lain back down. No reason to let them see, if she did start blubbering. 

Slowly, the room slipped into darkness and the quiet of slumbering teenage girls. After what felt like years of lying awake with wet cheeks and quiet sobs, Hermione’s eyes slipped closed and she joined them in the realm of dreams.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And finally, we meet more of Hermione's new house mates! I originally meant to cover more time in this chapter, but (as seems to be turning into a habit), a few scenes got away from me, and I decided to put the chapter break here.
> 
> Next chapter, however, you can look forward to seeing how Hermione deals with her first day of classes, and meet a few Slytherins.

**Author's Note:**

> The prologue is fairly short, but chapter one will be up tomorrow and will be longer. Please do let me know what you think if you read and enjoy. I thrive on comments (just like most fic authors, I imagine).


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